Aéronautique Navale

The first Marine Nationale (French Navy) Airbus H160B was delivered on 12 January 2023 to Base Aeronautique Navale (BAN, Naval Air Station) Lanveoc-Poulmic (Brittany) for use with Flotille 32F "Evit ma vevo ar re all” (So that others may live). Pending the final military version, the Airbus H160M Guépard, an interim fleet of six H160Bs will be leased from Babcock. These helicopters will be flown by French Navy crews and will provide Search & Rescue (SAR).

(Cherbourg/Maupertus, 7 April 2024, Wouter Cooremans)

A French Navy NH90-NFH was visiting Gilze-Rijen airbase In 2018, a rare visit to the Netherlands.

(Gilze Rijen, 2018, Vincent Loedeman)

A handful CAP10s are still operational at Lanvéoc/Poulmic

(Melun, September 2023, Gert Jan Mentink)

The Embraer Xingus are regularly seen outside France.

(Waddington, 13 March 2023, Manolito Jaarsma)

Many missions are perfomed by the Falcon 10MER. Based at Landiviseau, 57S received these aircraft in 1981 and has used them since for liasion, training and calibration flights.

(Rotterdam-The Hague, 27 February 2019, Frank De Koster)

The Rafale M was the first production Rafale and was introduced in 2001. It became operational on board the carrier Charles de Gaulle with the F1 version restricted to the air defence role. In 2007 the first Rafale M F2 versions were delivered and immediately active as multirole aircraft in Tajikistan in support of the NATO International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.

(Andravida, April 2024, Roel Reijne)

While other nations are slowly moving to new patrol aircraft, the French Navy is still using the Brequet Atlantic which was first delivered in 1965. Dassault Aviation's Falcon10X and Airbus A320Neo are in the running to replace the fleet in the future.

(Nordholz, 22 November 2022, Frank Noort)

The Aeronavale possesses three E-2 Hawkeyes which are based at Lorient/Lann-Bihoué

(Kleine Brogel, 11 September 2021, Pieter van Polanen)