The Spanish Ministry of Defence will equip Spanish Air Force EF-18s with 80 Thales Scorpion Helmet Mounted Cueing Systems (HMCS). These HMCS will be installed in the aircraft during the course of 2016 and 2017, once the operational qualification phase and air-to- air (A2A) and air-to-ground (A2G) tests have been completed.

Scorpion offers full colour symbology (navigation, intelligence, combat, etc.) for both night and day missions, in addition to target cueing in potentially degraded visual environments. The system is fully interchangeable between helmets/pilots as it is installed directly over standard helmets.

Thales will be responsible for the viability study, testing phase, integration with test aircraft, qualification support and integration in the fleet. Thales will also be responsible for the development and production of the specific Scorpion configuration for the Spanish EF-18 including ejection safety analysis. The qualification phase includes inter-operability with the IRIS-T missile and the day/night imaging pod for target cueing.

The HMCS uses Thales HObIT (Hybrid Optical based Inertial Tracking) technology, the hybrid reference system that guarantees high precision with minimum cockpit intrusion. For night missions, Scorpion can be operated with standard unmodified night vision goggles (NVG), therefore offering the same quality colour/video imaging symbol combination.

The system is already operational on multiple platforms in the United States such as the F-16 Block 30/32 and the A-10 Thunderbolt II and has been flight tested on the F-22, the NH90 and many other platforms. At present, the system is being actively evaluated by other clients globally.