The on-again, off-again competition for the United Arab Emirates’ airborne early warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft contract was on again at the 10th biennial Dubai Air Show, where there were rumors but no announced decision.

Many attendees speculated the contract would go to Northrop Grumman, which flew UAE military officials aboard its E-2 Hawkeye on Nov. 2. But Boeing executives, whose 737 AEW&C was one of the few aircraft that made its international debut in Dubai, said they were more than confident they will win the contract.

“As far as we’re concerned, there is no competition,” said Mark Ellis, Boeing’s Peace Eagle program manager.

Boeing’s militarized 737 carries Northrop’s multimission electronically scanned array (MESA) radar, which is billed as interoperable with U.S. and coalition forces and able to track targets while maintaining a 360-degree lookout for aircraft and ships. The plane also features bunks and a convection oven to help airmen stay fresh during missions of up to 12 hours.

“The competition, if there is any, can’t do anything like that,” Ellis said.

The AEW&C aircraft, the Peace Eagle in Turkish configuration, made its first mission checkout flight Oct. 30. The plane on display was the first of four ordered by Turkey in 2006 and is undergoing modification by Turkish Aerospace Industry, a local partner on the program.

Although the first plane is being built and tested in Seattle, the three remaining aircraft will be modified at the TAI facility in Ankara, Ellis said. Delivery of the first aircraft is scheduled in 2011, and the final three in 2012.

Australia and South Korea have also ordered 737 AEW&Cs. In spite of some initial development problems early in the program, all six of the Australian version of the plane, known as the Wedgetail, will be delivered by the end of 2009, Ellis said.

“It’s one of those competitions where every customer wants it now ... and we’re working on it as fast as we can,” Ellis said.

Northrop’s E-2C Hawkeye on display in Dubai sported a few modifications that turned it into the so-called Hawkeye 2000 (HE2K), including eight-blade rotors that boost gas mileage and reduce vibration.

Jerry Spruill, program director of AEW&C International Programs, said the rotors help bridge the gap between the E-2C that arrived in the early 1990s and the forthcoming Advanced Hawkeye E-2D, which the U.S. Navy expects to be flying by 2011. “If the HE2K is an evolutionary step for this platform, the Advanced Hawkeye is a revolutionary one,” he said.

The first E-2D has completed 17 tests in St. Augustine, Fla., since its first flight in August. A second test article is in the midst of the final rounds of ground testing, and naval aviators expect to have it in the air before year’s end, said Capt. Tom Carroll, Naval Air Systems Command and NavAir’s program manager for the Hawkeye.

The question of whether to buy an HE2K now wait for the E-2D has been cited as one reason for the delay in UAE’s AEW&C decision; a contract award was expected in mid-2007.

Carroll said the E-2D will look almost exactly like today’s E-2 but will be an entirely different aircraft, with a next-generation APY-9 radar, glass cockpit, new mission computer, more comfortable seats, advanced communications systems and identify-friend-or-foe capabilities.

Eight-blade rotors powered by Rolls-Royce T56-A427A engines and airborne-refueling and wet-wing options will boost mission-time capability from five hours to eight or longer. “It casts the same shadow on the ramp, but the similarities end there,” he said.

Some of the changes, such as the rotors and seats, are gradually being tested and retrofitted on existing Hawkeyes, taking them from E-2C to HE2K status, Spruill said.

Over the next four years, Northrop will receive $408 million in a pilot program contract to build the next three planes; that contract follows up on the U.S. Navy’s $2 billion contract with Northrop for system development and design signed in 2003.