E-2C Hawkeye

Description: The E-2 Hawkeye is the Navy's all-weather, carrier-based tactical battle management airborne early warning, command and control aircraft. The E-2 is a twin engine, five crewmember, high-wing turboprop aircraft with a 24-foot diameter radar rotodome attached to the upper fuselage.

Features: The Hawkeye provides all-weather airborne early warning, airborne battle management and command and control functions for the Carrier Strike Group and Joint Force Commander. Additional missions include surface surveillance coordination, air interdiction, offensive and defensive counter air control, close air support coordination, time critical strike coordination, search and rescue airborne coordination and communications relay. An integral component of the Carrier Strike Group air wing, the E-2C uses computerized radar, Identification Friend or Foe and electronic surveillance sensors to provide early warning, threat analysis against potentially hostile air and surface targets.

Background: The continuous improvements in early airborne radars by 1956 led to the concept of an airborne early warning and command and control aircraft. The first aircraft to perform this mission was the Grumman E-1 Tracer (a variant of the S-2 Tracker anti-submarine aircraft), which saw service from 1954 to 1964. The E-1's successor, the E-2 Hawkeye, was the first carrier-based aircraft designed from the outset for the all-weather airborne early warning and command and control mission.

050712-N-5345W-024 jpg Atlantic Ocean (July 12, 2005) - An E-2C Hawkeye, assigned to the "Seahawks" of Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron One Two Six (VAW-126),

takes to the air after conducting a touch-and-go landing on the flight deck aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman (CVN 75). Truman is currently conducting carrier qualifications in the Atlantic Ocean. U.S. Navy photo by Photographer's Mate 3rd Class Kristopher Wilson (RELEASED) Download Full High Resolution Image All information on navy.mil is public domain and may be distributed or copied unless otherwise specified. Use of appropriate byline/photo/image credits is requested.

Leave a comment, make a request, Let this small sampling be a guide to better quality, more plentiful, public domain, royalty free, copyright free, high resolution, images, stock photos, jpeg, jpg, free for commercial use, clip art, clipart, clip-art.