It is reported that several four-engine Gaoxin-6 anti-submarine aircraft were delivered to the People’s Liberation Army Navy late last year, four years after the first prototype of the aircraft was unveiled.
The aircraft known as the Gaoxin-6 is based on China’s Y-8 medium-range transport plane, but “the aircraft can easily be distinguished from other Y-8 variants by its large sea-search radar, mounted below the cockpit, and the magnetic anomaly detector boom that looks like a metal tail,” China Daily reports.
The plane is allegedly operated by a crew of ten, and “is capable of flying 6,000 kilometers or staying in the air for more than eight hours.”
This is the first large aircraft China has developed precisely for anti-submarine warfare, making Beijing the sixth country after United States, Russia, Japan, the UK and France to have developed such a sophisticated anti-submarine warfare (ASW) plane, according to the report in the China Daily.
