Inside Australian spy plane’s secretive night over Europe

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A quiet night is a good night on a surveillance plane over Eastern Europe. That’s because a busy night means terror is coming to someone on the ground below.

I’ve been speaking with the crew of an aircraft patrolling the skies over the eastern edges of Poland. They can’t tell me exactly where they’ve been, but it is safe to say they’ve been closer to the war in Ukraine than most pilots and crew will ever want to get. And they’ve been doing it to monitor Russian attacks and keep the rest of Europe safe.

An RAAF Wedgetail flies in formation with Australian and US jets in a file photograph.

The crew of this spy plane are trained to watch a bank of screens along the cabin of their E-7A Wedgetail, gathering the radar signals from a bulging fin on the spine of the aircraft. They are prepared for a hectic shift and know they are above a war zone. But they are human: they feel no joy in seeing the screens light up.

They do have a sense of satisfaction, however, about their work. “It’s rewarding when we get to deliver on our mission,” says Flight Lieutenant Rhett Allen, who oversees the team monitoring the screens.

He is careful not to say too much. The crew will not talk about how closely they can track Russian aircraft, missiles or drones. Nor how quickly they can relay this data to allies.

Flight Lieutenant Rhett Allen, Corporal Jonathan Zingle, Flight Lieutenant Georgia Crean.

At the Melsbroek Air Base in Belgium, we’re a long way from the combat in Ukraine. The Wedgetail is about to head home to Australia. This is a RAAF mission and it is relatively rare. Australia sent a similar aircraft to Germany two years ago, but the deployment to Poland this year was more demanding.

One task was to set up the Australian operation on bare concrete at a Polish air base. Another was to connect the aircraft to NATO systems, so that everything they saw could be relayed to allies. This means the RAAF aircraft was integrated into NATO missions with dozens of aircraft. Some flights lasted 15 hours.

It was in the sky for NATO during the September 19 incursion of Russian jet fighters into Estonian airspace, and when Russian missiles and drones bombarded Ukraine in record numbers on September 28. It flew 45 missions.

“To be able to communicate is a big success,” Corporal Jonathan Zingle, another of the RAAF crew, says. Like Allen, he has a talent for understatement. Anyone who’s cursed their Wi-Fi will be impressed with an expert who can connect an Australian aircraft to NATO squadrons and ground staff at high speed, in flight, over secure channels.

An E-7A Wedgetail aircraft at RAAF Williamtown.

One of the pilots, Flight Lieutenant Georgia Crean, says the work is mentally demanding, and not only because they have to be ready to fly at any moment and stay alert for long hours. They are conscious of the conflict in Ukraine below. “It’s at the forefront of all of our minds.”

Crean never expected to be flying over Europe. She grew up wanting to be a journalist – inspired, she says, by cub reporter Rory Gilmore on The Gilmore Girls – and only discovered the RAAF when she kept a schoolmate company on a visit to an Australian Defence Force recruiting centre.

“I walked in with absolutely no intent to do aviation,” she says. “And they welcomed me with open arms. They took me to Tamworth and I flew for two weeks, and my first ever flight in Tamworth was one of the most incredible experiences.” She was flying a CT/4 trainer and was hooked.

“In the space of three months I decided that aviation was my path. I would love for aviation to be pushed to more females, because I don’t think it’s at the forefront of many girls’ minds in high school.”

A child watches firefighters work at homes destroyed by a Russian strike on September 28 in Kyiv.

I wrote briefly about the Wedgetail operation earlier, but I wanted to write more about the crew. It is rare to speak directly to ADF members about their work, and the Wedgetail team shows that Australia remains connected to the war in Europe. Unfortunately, without a ceasefire, it is only a matter of time before NATO asks for another Australian deployment.

There has been no major Australian pledge so far this year to give Ukraine any additional help. The last big commitment, announced last year, was to send 49 Abrams M1A1 tanks worth $245 million. The Australian support looks too modest when European allies have been increasing their support for Ukraine this year with more money and weapons.

But there’s no doubt about the commitment from the 90 personnel in the RAAF deployment.

Crean is from the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, Zingle is from Penrith in western Sydney and Allen is from Wangaratta in country Victoria. In a sense, they are recent examples of the Australians who have served in Europe over more than a century in peace and war. We’ll be reminded of that history at the Remembrance Day ceremonies in Europe next week.

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