Briefings : Castle, F136, Club-K

Two ex-Royal Navy Castle class patrol ships are to be refitted, overhauled and upgraded for the Bangladeshi Navy. The deal will secure 100 jobs at the A&P Tyne shipyard.

Ex-HMS Leeds Castle, one of the ships bound for Bangladesh

GE & Rolls Royce have improved their price offer for the troubled alternative engine for the JSF which has often been threatened with termination. The price of the F136 engines delivered in FY2014 and 2015 will now be cut. The new price deal could cut the cost to the Pentagon by a billion dollars over the next couple of years.

A new Russian "super weapon" could put the world's navies under serious threat apparently. The Club-K system is an advanced cruise missile and is said to be able to destroy an enemy aircraft carrier 300 miles away. The Russians themselves say the threat of the missile has been exaggerated especially claims the missile could be hidden in shipping containers and end up in the hands of terrorists, which is all a bit James Bond to be honest.

Briefings : Ash damage (or not), Trident, X-37B

Checks on the engines of Finnish air force F-18s which were contaminated by ash from the Icelandic volcano indicate no significant damage was caused to the engines. The RAF has also said no damage was caused to the engine of some of it's Typhoons which ingested some ash. Typhoon training flights have thus resumed.

The issue of replacing Trident came up again in the second of the debates between the leaders of the three main parties in the UK general election (though little else on foreign affairs in what was supposed to be a debate dedicated to it). The Liberals say they will not replace Trident but will seek to maintain Britain's nuclear deterrent through other cheaper means. The other parties attacked their stance. The BBC asks if there is a cheaper alternative.

The USAF's X-37B space plane has successfully been launched into space for the first time. How long the X-37B will stay in orbit is apparently unknown even to the USAF.

Briefings : Northumberland, Argentina, X-37B

Type 23 frigate HMS Northumberland has deployed to the Middle East on a 7 month mission.

Argentina is to buy 2 Mi-171E helicopters from Russia, the first time Argentina has bought weapons from the Russians.

The US' new space plane, the X-37B, could be launched into space for the first time today. The X-37B can spend up to 9 months in orbit and will conduct some classified experiments while up there.

Briefings : Albion, VXX, Iran

HMS Albion has arrived in the Spanish port of Santander to bring home British troops returning from Afghanistan who could not fly into the UK because of the current restrictions as well as some civilians. Ark Royal and Ocean are also on standby to bring home Britons from Channel ports (though the current ferries seem able to cope at the moment).

Earlier reports that NATO F-16s had suffered engine damage after flying through the volcanic ash cloud are now being thrown into doubt.

The US are relaunching it's VIP helicopter programme after the horrific cost overruns that scuppered the VH-71. The new VXX could see a new joint bid by Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky though that probably means the airframe won't be a European design which angers some Americans (though of course they don't mind Europeans buying American aeroplanes).

Iran showed off it's military hardware though are these SA-20s or oil drums on the back of a truck?

Video : Watchkeeper first flight

The first flight of the British Army's new UAV Watchkeeper.

Briefings : Volcano, Choenan, Portland

HMS Ark Royal, Albion and Ocean have been deployed to help bring British people trapped abroard home. They are heading to Spain and other ports in the English Channel.

The Finnish air force have released pictures of potential damage caused to the engines of one of it's F-18s by flying through an ash cloud from the erupting Icelandic volcano that has largely closed European airspace.

South Korea is investigating the possibility of the corvette Choenan being sunk by a North Korean Shark class mini-submarine. Two of the Sharks at a DPRK naval base are unaccounted for at the time of the sinking.

Type 23 frigate HMS Portland set sail for the South Atlantic last week to replace the destroyer HMS York. As it's remit includes the Falklands then Portland has a potentially interesting deployment.

Royal Navy to bring Brits home?

With the closure of European airspace continuing and the prospect of restrictions continuing for some time the UK emergency committee COBRA is to meet tomorrow and there was an emergency cabinet meeting today. One idea is apparently to fly as many people as possible into Spain which still has some of it's airspace open and then bring people home using Royal Navy and chartered merchant ships. A British Airways 747 is among a number of European airliners which have made test flights today.