See
here.
A navalised Typhoon in the colours of 899NAS
"The only STOBAR aircraft type to be considered by the FCBA/JCA studies was a marinised Eurofighter Typhoon EF2000. Initial pre-feasibility studies were undertaken in early 1996 by British Aerospace's (now BAE Systems) Military Aircraft and Aerostructures Department to consider a Eurofighter Typhoon (N) (possible service name - Sea Typhoon). These looked promising and in 1997 a further 27 month contract was let to study in more detail both catapult-launched (CTOL) and STOBAR variants, these would have in common a strengthened undercarriage and an arrestor hook, and possibly a larger thicker wing with power folding and more powerful vectored thrust EJ200 engines. Both variants would have required a large conventional carrier design equipped with an angled flight deck and arrested wires for landing.
The UK was not the only potential customer for a navalised Typhoon, Eurofighter GmbH (the consortium which builds and sells Typhoon) is reported to have briefed the Italian Navy during 2000 about a low-cost, reduced weight, arrestor landing/angled deck variant of the Typhoon that could operate from the Italian Navy’s new 25,000 tonnes carrier, Conte di Cavour, which is due to enter service in 2006/7. The company has also offered another customer (probably India) a “more radically modified naval version of the aircraft”, presumably the STOBAR variant studied for the UK.
BAE Systems continued with varying amounts of enthusiasm (apparently depending on its likely JSF workshare at the time!) to push Typhoon (N) as an alternative to JSF, stressing the Typhoon's higher speed, range and payload, although admitting it would be less stealthy. A Typhoon (N) would also have the advantage of considerable commonality with the 232 Eurofighter Typhoon's already planned for the RAF.
BAE Systems suggested that costly airframe strengthening and a new undercarriage for Typhoon (N), as traditionally required for aircraft "navalisation" of a land based aircraft, could be avoided by using sophisticated computer controlled precise landing systems and other aids to reduce arrested landing stresses to within existing Typhoon limits - which are far below those currently normal for hard carrier operations. Apparently even giant fans blowing air over the aft flight deck and in to the final landing approach were considered! But these BAE's idea's do not seem to have been accepted by the MOD, indeed they would appear to be a rather risky cost reduction measure which have become a source of major problems in the future, e.g. preventing flight operations in heavy seas or leading to costly repairs of prematurely fatigued aircraft.
During 1999-2000 a fully navalised STOBAR Typhoon seemed to be the only real competitor to JSF for the JCA order, but in January 2001 (just prior to the UK signing a MoU for the JSF SDD phase) reports appeared in the UK press that it had been eliminated on cost and safety grounds, e.g. the flight deck clearance of external weapons was considered dangerously low for the robust nature of carrier launch and landing events, and the canards dangerously restricted the pilots view during high angle of attack carrier landings.
In May 2001 Sir Robert Walmsley, Head of the Defence Procurement Agency, when asked about the possibility of a navalised Eurofighter if JSF was cancelled said: "It is not currently designed so that it could use a carrier. We could change the design but we would be faced with a huge piece of work. The materials would probably have to be changed in order to avoid corrosion; the weight of the undercarriage would have to be doubled to support carrier landing which would eat into the payload margin; and the wing roots would have to be strengthened in order to take the full inertia forces on landing. That sounds to me like a very substantial redesign. It is always possible, but it would cost a huge amount of money and it would certainly add very considerably to the cost of the aircraft".