A fourth and final unit of the early warning aircraft Peace Eye has been delivered to Korea's Air Force, the state arms procurement agency said Wednesday.
The delivery marks the completion of a US$1.6 billion project launched in 2006 to buy four modified versions of the high-altitude surveillance aircraft from Boeing to strengthen South Korea's aerial surveillance capabilities against North Korea.
The first two planes were delivered last year and the third in May. The last three units were assembled at Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI), a local aerospace firm, under Boeing's supervision.
"With the completion of Peace Eye's deployment, we can now detect and watch about 1,000 flying objects at the same time at 360 degrees," an official at the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) said.
"We are able to watch aerial and maritime targets anywhere over and around the Korean Peninsula, and can detect all low-altitude planes infiltrating through mountainous regions," the official said. (Yonhap)