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Air Force looking to replace
search and rescue choppers
OCTOBER
26, 2004 - According to an October 2004 article in National Defense magazine, the Air Force is planning to
replace its Personnel Recovery Vehicle, the helicopter used in search and rescue operations.
According to the article, before the Air Force selects a company to produce the new search and
rescue vehicle, it will probably keep its eye on the U.S. Navy's contract competition to build
the next-generation presidential helicopter. In the article, Joe Haddock, Sikorsky vice
president for government relations, said the company selected to build the president's chopper
will have "a sizeable advantage" in the competition for the Air Force's PRV.
Mr. Haddock told the defense magazine, “The Air Force doesn’t want to spend a lot of money for
the PRV ... It is perfectly willing to let the Navy pay the research and development costs
while replacing the presidential helicopter and adapting that helicopter to the PRV role.”
The Navy is responsible for replacing the presidential helicopter (commonly referred to as
"Marine One") and officials said they expect to award a $1.6 billion contract for 23 choppers
in December. Competing for the job are teams led by the likes of Sikorsky, Lockheed Martin,
Northrop Grumman, EADS North America and a Bell Helicopter-Boeing team.
Once the Navy contract has been award, reports suggest the Air Force will jump on board, but
with a bigger contract ... the Air Force wants to buy 132 PRVs to replace aging HH-60G Pave
Hawks.
However, according to reports, the Air Force's new helicopter might not be an actual
helicopter.
While most of the companies are offering your "typical" helicopter designs (Northrop Grumman
and EADS are offering the NH90, Sikorsky is offering up its very cool H-92 Superhawk, and
Lockheed is pushing the US101), perhaps one of the more exciting offers was the one made by the
Bell-Boeing team. That team is supposedly offering up the CV-22 Osprey. The Osprey is a
tilt-rotor aircraft that can takeoff vertically (like a helicopter), then tilt its
rotors and
fly as an airplane.
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