Aviation Photography - HHA's Hawker Hunter F.58 ZZ190

Air to Air Photography
Hunter Mk.58 (ZZ190)
Southern England
November 13, 2015

Hawker Hunter F.58 (ZZ190 registered G-HHAE ex Swiss AF J-4066 and previously G-BXNZ) operates under civil owned military aircraft (COMA) regulations. For this air to air photo-shoot was flown by Simon Hargreaves Head of Flying at Hawker Hunter Aviation Ltd (HHA) which are based at RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire. Flying south from Scampton on a two hour pilot currency flight it was in our area in just 20 minutes. Our 40 minute flight from Thruxton airfield in a Beech 99 camera-ship. The weather radar had shown on this very cloudy day with showers that there was a clear patch roughly over the New Forest region south of Thruxton. We took off and climbed to 7,000 feet to rendezvous with the Hunter over Fordingbridge, which is where we circled with the Hunter for the next 32 minutes.

HHA is a MoD and CAA approved contractor for the Armed Forces in the Aerial Support to Joint Training Readiness (ASJTR) role encompassing threat simulation, mission support training, photo-chase and radar calibration taskings. The HHA fleet of seven modified Hunters with HITS (Hunter Integrated Threat System) are able to replicate 80% of aircraft or missile threats making them a very cost effective training solution for air forces.