GE Aerospace and Poland’s Military Aviation Works No. 2 (WZL-2) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to explore the development of maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) and depot-level maintenance capabilities for the F404-GE-102 engine.
The engine powers the Polish Air Force’s KAI FA-50 Golden Eagle light combat aircraft. Under the MoU, GE Aerospace and WZL-2 will assess the requirements for establishing F404-GE-102 maintenance capabilities in Poland.
The planned support would cover the 48 F404-GE-102 engines associated with Poland’s FA-50 aircraft order, as well as spare engines. Poland ordered 48 FA-50 aircraft from KAI in 2022, with the first 12 delivered in the FA-50GF configuration in 2023. The remaining 36 aircraft are being delivered in the FA-50PL configuration.
The agreement was announced at the International Defence Industry Exhibition (MSPO) in Kielce by WZL-2 CEO Jakub Gazda, WZL-2 Technical Director Zbigniew Matuszczak, and Scott Keating, GE Aerospace’s Defense & Systems Executive Regional General Manager for Europe.
“Establishing engine support within Poland is critically important to ensure readiness and availability for our military customer,” said Scott Keating, GE Aerospace’s Defense & Systems Executive Regional General Manager for Europe. “We look forward to working with WZL-2, a well-respected engine MRO provider in Poland, to determine how we can best serve Poland’s needs on the F404 engines to offer this capability in-country.”
WZL-2 is expected to work with GE Aerospace to develop the technical capabilities required to support the F404-GE-102. The work would provide a domestic maintenance option for engines used by the Polish FA-50 fleet.
“Our partnership with GE Aerospace offers us the opportunity to develop our expertise in servicing F404-GE-102 engines. We want to ensure that increasingly advanced maintenance capabilities for equipment used by the Polish Armed Forces are developed and maintained domestically,” said Jakub Gazda, CEO of WZL-2, adding: “This is yet another example of WZL-2’s consistent development of capabilities that strengthen the security and operational independence of the Polish Armed Forces.”
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The F404 family has accumulated more than 13 million engine flight hours, with more than 4,000 engines delivered. The engine is also used on the T-50, TA-50, and FA-50 aircraft produced in South Korea.
The MoU represents an initial step toward establishing F404-GE-102 engine maintenance capability at WZL-2. Further work will determine the technical, infrastructure, and other requirements needed to support depot-level maintenance in Poland.
