BAE's promotional footage at Farnborough included a Brontanax lifting off a Queen Elizabeth-class deck. The official material around the reveal covered RAF requirements — StormFighter, land basing, Typhoon and Tempest teaming. Separately, the Royal Navy's Project Vanquish is looking at jet-powered uncrewed aircraft able to operate from a QE deck without a catapult or arrestor wire. No link between the two has been announced.
Any deck-capable variant would be a different aircraft from the land-based demonstrator being built at Warton: stronger landing gear, a shorter take-off run, materials rated for prolonged salt-air exposure, and a launch and recovery method compatible with existing deck cycles. That work would need its own budget line, and none has been published.
The wider context is documented. The US Navy has MQ-25 Stingray in development, Turkey has flown Bayraktar TB3 from TCG Anadolu, and China has shown deck-launched uncrewed designs. The QE-class currently operates crewed F-35B aircraft only.
What is on the public record: the footage exists, Vanquish exists, and BAE built the QE-class carriers. Nothing beyond that has been stated by BAE, the RAF or the Royal Navy. Concrete signals to watch for would be a Vanquish concept study naming an airframe, or Navy participation in Brontanax briefings.
