Hawkei Information

The Hawkei PMV is a light Four-wheel drive protected mobility vehicle originally designed to meet an Australian Defence Force (ADF) requirement for a light armoured patrol vehicle to replace some of its Land Rover Perentie variants. The Hawkei is a highly mobile, highly protected, 7-tonne vehicle, with in-built systems to allow it to be used as a fighting platform. It has been developed with Vehicle Electronic Architecture to be mission system ready. Prime contractors include: Thales Australia, Boeing Australia, Plasan (Israel) and PAC Group. In October 2015, the Australian Government announced the purchase of 1,100 Hawkeis from Thales Australia.

As part of a wider project to replace the ADFs fleet of operational support vehicles, Project Land 121 Phase 4 – Protected Mobility Vehicle (Light) or PMV-L, is a requirement for up to 1,300 specialised light armoured vehicles replace some of the in-service Land Rovers. Key criteria for the project included: off-road mobility, integrated vehicle electronic architecture, substantial payloads, high levels of protection against land mines, improvised explosive devices and ballistic weapons while being light enough to be air transported by military helicopters. The three options considered as part of the project were:

Competitors for the MSA option included the combat proven MOWAG Eagle IV from General Dynamics Land Systems; the British military then selected Ocelot from Force Protection; and the Hawkei offering from Thales Australia. The JTLV option included entries from BAE Systems/Navistar,AM General/General Dynamics and Lockheed Martin.

In December 2011 the Australian Department of Defence announced Hawkei as the preferred vehicle for further development and testing under the MSA option.

In October 2015, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and Minister for Defence Marise Payne announced the purchase of 1,100 Hawkeis and 1,000 trailers at a cost of $1.3 billion.

In November 2017 it was reported that the Hawkei was being considered by Poland as part of a modernisation of the countrys military. This could result in an initial purchase of 50 vehicles, and as many as 700 over the long term.

In September 2018 the Australian National Audit Office released a report which criticised aspects of the Hawkei project. The report judged that Australia should have remained in the JLTV program to provide competition for the Hawkei procurement and that the Department of Defence had not kept ministers fully informed about the Hawkei program. This included not providing ministers with a study which found that there were few benefits from building the vehicles in Australia. The ANAO was unable to publish some elements of the audit after Attorney General Christian Porter ruled that publishing it would compromise national security. Thales had taken legal action earlier in the year seeking to have material removed from the report.

As of December 2018, the Hawkei is facing reliability issues following a demonstration test conducted on 19 November 2018, delaying full-rate production.

All variants use the same four wheeled platform.

Dual cab manned by a crew of four to six, weapons system options including up to 12.7mm guns or 40mm grenade systems in various mounts with a remote operated option.

Dual cab manned by a crew of four to six, various equipment options including force protection radar, surveillance and communications systems.

Dual cab manned by a crew of four to six with up to three weapon systems:

Single-extended cab with a flat-bed cargo area measuring; L: 2,000 mm (79 in) x W: 2,400 mm (94 in). The vehicle is manned by a crew of 2-3 and has a kerb weight of 6,800 kg (14,991 lb) with a rated cargo load of 3,000 kg (6,614 lb). The load bed is designed to accommodate four 1000mm × 1200mm (40" x 48") NATO standard military pallets or a single tricon (one-third ISO 20 ft) container.

The Hawkei is named after Acanthophis hawkei, a species of death adder. In turn, the snake is named after former Prime Minister of Australia Bob Hawke.

 Australia

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