AP 118 · No. 10 Section II · Aircraft Plate 283 / 283

Plate 283 of 283 · Modern age · Strategic and tactical airlifter

Airbus A400M Atlas

Atlas C1, ZM403, painted as ZM403, an Airbus A400M Atlas C1 of the Royal Air Force, one of the 22 Atlases (ZM400 to ZM421) flown from RAF Brize Norton by Nos. 24, 30 and 70 Squadrons: a four-engined military airlifter with a high, slightly swept wing set with anhedral, four Europrop TP400-D6 turboprops driving eight-bladed Ratier-Figeac scimitar propellers that turn in opposite directions on each wing, a T-tail, a wide, deep cargo hold ending in a loading ramp under the upswept tail, main undercarriage of three pairs of wheels each side in fuselage sponsons and an in-flight refuelling probe above the cockpit: RAF blue-grey overall with a black radome, black spinners and black yellow-tipped propeller blades, black ‘ROYAL AIR FORCE’ titles on the forward fuselage, ‘403’ on the nose, low-visibility red and blue roundels with a black ‘ZM403’ on the rear fuselage and on the upper wings, a small red and blue fin flash and yellow propeller-warning bands, as photographed at Sumburgh in 2020 (shape from Airbus’s own side, front and plan drawings of the A400M, scaled to the published height of 14.7 m and checked against side-on photographs of ZM403; the parked propeller pitch and the exhausts on the far side of each nacelle, which no photograph shows, are assumed, and the small stencils are left off).

3D model

Turn it over

A procedural model built in Blender from published dimensions, drawings and photographs, painted as ZM403, an Airbus A400M Atlas C1 of the Royal Air Force, one of the 22 Atlases (ZM400 to ZM421) flown from RAF Brize Norton by Nos. 24, 30 and 70 Squadrons: a four-engined military airlifter with a high, slightly swept wing set with anhedral, four Europrop TP400-D6 turboprops driving eight-bladed Ratier-Figeac scimitar propellers that turn in opposite directions on each wing, a T-tail, a wide, deep cargo hold ending in a loading ramp under the upswept tail, main undercarriage of three pairs of wheels each side in fuselage sponsons and an in-flight refuelling probe above the cockpit: RAF blue-grey overall with a black radome, black spinners and black yellow-tipped propeller blades, black ‘ROYAL AIR FORCE’ titles on the forward fuselage, ‘403’ on the nose, low-visibility red and blue roundels with a black ‘ZM403’ on the rear fuselage and on the upper wings, a small red and blue fin flash and yellow propeller-warning bands, as photographed at Sumburgh in 2020 (shape from Airbus’s own side, front and plan drawings of the A400M, scaled to the published height of 14.7 m and checked against side-on photographs of ZM403; the parked propeller pitch and the exhausts on the far side of each nacelle, which no photograph shows, are assumed, and the small stencils are left off). Drag to orbit, scroll or pinch to zoom · download .glb (1.6 MB)

Data plate

Specification

First flight, number built and top speed are for the whole family (Atlas C1); engine, crew and dimensions are for the Atlas C1, ZM403 modelled here.

History

The Atlas C1

By the 1980s the air forces of Western Europe knew that their Hercules and Transalls would need replacing, and that no aircraft on offer sat between the Hercules and the much larger, jet-powered C-17. Several nations studied a joint Future Large Aircraft for more than a decade before seven of them, Germany, France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Turkey, Belgium and Luxembourg, signed a contract in May 2003 through the European defence procurement agency OCCAR for 180 aircraft, built by Airbus Military. The A400M was to carry about twice a Hercules’s load, fly as fast as a jet transport over long distances and still land on short, rough strips.

The design paired a high wing, made largely of carbon-fibre composite and designed at Filton near Bristol, with a wide, tall hold that could take helicopters, armoured vehicles or 116 paratroops, loaded over a ramp under the T-tail. Its four TP400-D6 engines, built for it by a consortium of Rolls-Royce, Safran, MTU and ITP, are among the most powerful turboprops ever made, and on each wing the two eight-bladed propellers turn in opposite directions. Development ran years late and well over budget, mostly because of the engine and its software, and the first A400M did not fly until 11 December 2009, from Seville, where the type is assembled.

France received the first in 2013. The RAF, which cut its order from 25 to 22, took its first Atlas C1, ZM400, at RAF Brize Norton in November 2014, and the Atlas has since replaced the Hercules there. In May 2015 a new A400M crashed on a test flight near Seville, killing four of its crew, after a software fault left three of its engines unable to respond. RAF Atlases have flown supplies to the Caribbean after hurricanes, evacuated people from Kabul in August 2021 and carried aid and equipment to Ukraine. More than 125 have been built, for air forces in Europe and Asia.

This airframe

Atlas C1 ZM403

ZM403The airframe modelled

ZM403 is one of the RAF’s 22 Atlas C1s, serials ZM400 to ZM421, which fly from RAF Brize Norton with Nos. 24, 30 and 70 Squadrons. No A400M is in a museum, and ZM403 was chosen because it is unusually well photographed: a long series of pictures taken at Sumburgh in Shetland in April 2020, with others from Gloucestershire Airport in 2016 and Gibraltar in 2024. The model shows it as those photographs do: RAF blue-grey overall with a black radome, black spinners and black propeller blades with yellow tips, black ‘ROYAL AIR FORCE’ titles on the forward fuselage and ‘403’ on the nose, low-visibility red and blue roundels with a black ‘ZM403’ on the rear fuselage and on the upper wings, a small red and blue fin flash and yellow propeller-warning bands. Its shape comes from Airbus’s own side, front and plan drawings of the A400M, scaled to the published height and checked against side-on photographs of ZM403. The exhausts on the far side of each nacelle, which no photograph shows, are assumed to match the near side, and the small stencils are left off.

Where to see one

Not on charge

The RAF’s Atlas fleet flies with Nos. 24, 30 and 70 Squadrons from RAF Brize Norton and none is in a museum. Atlases are regulars at the Royal International Air Tattoo.

All 283 plates

Profiles and models are procedural interpretations built in Blender from published dimensions, three-view drawings and photographs of each airframe. Treat the museum aircraft as the reference.