RAF grounds Hawk fleet following crash

A Hawk T2 coming in to land at RAF Valley on Anglesey. A crash involving the type at the same location on 23 September 2026 has prompted the MoD to temporarily ground its entire fleet of Hawk T1 and Hawk T2 aircraft. (Janes/Gareth Jennings)

The UK Royal Air Force (RAF) has grounded its fleet of BAE Systems Hawk T1 and T2 advanced jet trainer aircraft following a crash at RAF Valley on Anglesey.

A source who declined to be identified told Janes that flight operations of the Hawk T1 airframes used by the Red Arrows aerobatic display team and the Hawk T2 airframes used for pilot fast jet training have been temporarily suspended after a Hawk T2 crashed shortly after take-off on 23 September 2023.

Both crewmembers were seen to have ejected from the stricken aircraft, and there were no reported injuries on the ground. The MoD has provided no further details on the incident.

The Red Arrows operate 10 Hawk T1s that are supported from a pool of spares of an unknown number of previously retired airframes (the team currently flies seven aircraft for dynamic displays, and nine for flypasts).

The RAF operates the Hawk T2 to train both its own and the Royal Navy's (RN's) fast jet pilots, with 28 of the type having entered service in 2009. It is used specifically for the Advanced Fast Jet Training (AFJT) programme, which sits outside the scope of the UK Military Flight Training System (UKMFTS) programme contracted to Ascent. A further nine Hawk Mk 167 (essentially the same T2 standard) aircraft are flown by 11 Squadron (Qatar) at RAF Leeming in northern England, but these were not named by the MoD as being included in the grounding order.