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This program must be picking up speed behind the scenes. Finmeccanica is posting pics of this plane on its Flickr site.
Regardless. Bell is going to regret letting this one slip away. I can see the AW609 being used by Homeland Security, the US Coast Guard, FBI and even some militarized versions being put into service by SOCOM, the 160th and even more foreign militaries than the MV-22 could even dream of.
The AW609 hits the sweet spot. Big enough for most utility missions, small enough to be weaponized and probably much less expensive than its bigger brother.
Yeah. Its taking a looooong time to get it up but it'll probably be worth it.
Its taking that long as it has to be financed in-house as a private venture by a relatively small company.
ReplyDeleteI would not call AugustaWestland a small company.
DeleteWould much rather see the Sikorsky S97 take form.
ReplyDeleteI don't like the time it takes tilt-rotors to transition from horizontal to vertical.
The real potential in this thing is air-ambulance.
ReplyDeleteThe advantages of extra speed is self explanatory, and most civilian helicopter media-vacs operate from prepared helipads. You may see the occasional one land on scene, but most of the time, ground ambulances transport patients to smaller hospitals first, and the air ambulance transport from one hospital to another.
A lot of air ambulances also operate a fixed wing fleet for repatriation and other duties. Having a single airframe for all jobs would certainly make sense.