Sky Talk

Israel says no interest in buying V-22

Bell Helicopter and Boeing are still looking for someone other than the U.S. Marines and Air Force to shell out big bucks for the V-22 Osprey.

Flight Global reports today that Israeli Air Forceofficials say they are no longer considering buying V-22s.

Israel confirmed in 2007 that it was evaluating the V-22 tilt-rotor, but an air force source says its interest has now been terminated. "The V-22 is not on our current list," the source adds.

The need for a new vertical take-off and landing aircraft became more acute following a decision to phase out some of the air force's legacy CH-53s. As an interim measure, it is prolonging the service lives of some of these aircraft by upgrading them to the CH-53 2025 configuration.

"We will wait for the CH-53K and evaluate it when it flies," says the air force source. The new type will maintain almost all the basic capabilities of Sikorsky's previous CH-53E, but will be capable of lifting a much heavier payload.

- Bob Cox

Special Delivery

The 2010 Chevy Camaro pace car was sent "special delivery" to Texas Motor Speedway for Sunday's race aboard a military Chinook helicopter.

- Bob Cox

Helicopter sale to Iraq planned

Reuters reports that the Bush administration has proposed the sale of $2.4 billion worth of military helicopters, rockets, missiles, other supplies and services to the government of Iraq.

The sale would include either 24 armed version of the Bell 407 civil helicopter, similar to the Army's OH-58D Kiowa Warriors and the planned ARH-70 armed reconnaissance helicopter, or an armed version of Boeing's AH-6 Little Bird, a version of an MD Helicopters civil aircraft.

The deal would also include large supplies of weapons and ammunition as well as support equipment, technical advice and training for the Iraqi Air Force. The details are included in this release from the Defense Security Cooperation Agency.

-- Bob Cox

Strong orders, high marks for Bell 429 copter

FARNBOROUGH, England -- Orders continue to pour into Bell Helicopter’s offices in Hurst for the company’s first all new helicopter in decades. Bell officials say they have upwards of 330 orders for the Bell 429 helicopter, which they expect to begin delivering to customers early in 2009.

                 Since March Bell has averaged about a dozen orders a month for the 429, a twin-engine civil helicopter priced in the neighborhood of $5 million each. The total order backlog is in the neighborhood of $1.2 to $1.5 billion.

Mike Blake, Bell executive vice president, said he expects the 429 to be certified safe and ready for delivery to buyers by the Federal Aviation Administration early next year.

                Blake said he’s very pleased with results from flight testing of three currently flying aircraft. Together they have flown more than 1,000 hours and, Blake said, met all performance criteria Bell originally set for the aircraft.

--Bob Cox

Bell: No clue how Army figures helicopter costs

FARNBOROUGH, England -- Bell Helicopter officials say they are not clear how the Army came up with the soaring cost estimates that have forced a high –level Pentagon review of the company’s armed reconnaissance helicopter program.

The average cost Bell has quoted the Army to build 512 ARH-70 armed scout helicopters, about $9.5 million each, has not changed since the last crisis point in the program in April 2007, Bob Kenney, executive vice president of military programs, said in a meeting Monday.

Army acquisition officials have notified the Pentagon and Congress that they now estimate the cost of building the helicopters has increased 27 percent in that time.

Read the full story in tomorrow's Star-Telegram.

-- Bob Cox

More trouble for Bell, Army helicopter

Just one year after Bell Helicopter won an 11th hour reprieve to save its troubled contract to build the Army's Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter, the company is apparently running well over budget again. This just in:

WASHINGTON, July 9 (Reuters) - The U.S. Army said Wednesday that it would consider canceling a $6.2 billion Textron Inc (TXT.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) armed helicopter program after notifying Congress that its projected costs had soared more than 40 percent above initial estimates.

One possibility after a review now getting going is that the Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter being built by Textron's Bell Helicopter unit could be "terminated," but the Army has a "critical" need for the capabilities at issue, said Paul Boyce, an Army spokesman.

As they say in television, stay tuned. The Star-Telegram will be talking to Army officials later today.

--Bob Cox

Bell doubts market for civil tilt-rotor

A new generation of Bell Helicopter leaders has taken a more realistic and pragmatic view of the real world potential for the company's tilt-rotor technology embodied in the vaunted V-22 Osprey.

A story in today's Star-Telegram reveals that Bell management doubts there is much of a market in the civil/commercial aviation world for the BA609 civil titlt-rotor aircraft the company has spent more than decade and hundreds of millions of dollars developing.

--Bob Cox

Marines say V-22 passed Iraq tests

Better late than never ...

The Marines held a press conference at the Pentagon last week to tell the world that the V-22 Osprey had performed well in Iraq. No one from the Star-Telegram or McClatchy was able to attend but the transcript of the session can be found here.

Lt. Gen. George Trautman, deputy commandant for aviation, said the Osprey lived up to expectations and performed all of its assigned missions. But Troutman added that the Iraq deployment was "a test, but not the final exam" for the Osprey.

Troutman said the Marines are on "a journey to exploit a new and revolutionary technology. And we're going to continue to learn lessons, and we're going to continue to improve and continue to work hard to exploit the capabilities this airplane brings.

"I don't want anybody to think that this is end of a journey. This is very much just the beginning. And I anticipate in the coming years and decades, as Air Force Special Operations Command and others see the utility of this airplane, it's just going to become more and more valuable across the board."

Inside the Navy (subscription required) reported on the session, leading with the fact Marine Osprey crews only encountered hostile fire on two occasions.

The first V-22 squadron spent most of its deployment conducting “general support” missions, involving moving Marines and supplies in and out of combat zones. The aircraft also conducted medical evacuation and other missions, according to the squadron. Their missions took them all across Iraq, and even as far as way as Kuwait and Jordan.

(Lt. Col. Paul) Rock said the fact that the aircraft saw so little combat could be seen as a testament to its speed and the difficulty enemies have in targeting it.

“That’s one of the great things about the aircraft . . . someone’s opportunity to engage us is very short,” he said.

- Bob Cox

MD Helicopters likes North Texas airport site

MD Helicopters owner Lynn Tilton likes what she saw and heard in Grayson County, but not so much Dallas.

Tilton, in an interview with the Star-Telegram, said today that North Texas Regional Airport, located between Denison and Sherman, has made her list of finalists as a possible site for relocating the helicopter manufacturing company.

"We really like the site. We really like the people. We think it will be a good long term solution," Tilton said.

Tilton said she is still considering four sites -- including Shreveport, Oklahoma City and one in Mesa, Ariz., but had eliminated Dallas Executive Airport from consideration.

Dallas officials were accomodating and made a good proposal, Tilton said, but because the airport is surrounded by residential and commercial areas it would not be a good long term location due to the added helicopter and airplane traffic MD would generate.

Tilton said she plans to visit Oklahoma City and Shreveport next week and could make a final decision sometime in May.

- Bob Cox

Set the TiVo: V-22 documentary scheduled

Public affairs staff at Bell Helicopter informs us that the Military Channel will feature a one-hour documentary program on the history and development of the V-22 Osprey on Monday, April 7.

The show airs at 10 pm EDT, 9 p.m Central. Bell says the program covers the Osprey from its inception following the failed Desert One hostage rescue attempt to current operations with Marine squadron VMM-263 in Al Asad, Iraq.

The program, Bell says "doesn’t ignore the mishaps of the earlier years, but covers them intelligently and objectively."  Most of the film is about VMM-263, the first squadron to take the V-22 to war and includes interviews with the men and women of the squadron. The program was written and produced by Richard Mackenzie, an award-winning film-maker who has produced dozens of documentaries for the Discovery Channel, the History Channel and the National Geographic Channel.

- Bob Cox