Production Presidential Helicopter Flies

This arti­cle first appeared at AviationWeek​.com.

AgustaWestland has begun fly­ing the pilot pro­duc­tion ver­sion of its VH-​​71A vari­ant of the AW101 for the U.S. pres­i­den­tial heli­copter pro­gram. The heli­copter, PP-​​1, was flown from the company’s Yeovil site in England on September 22. It is the first of five pro­duc­tion air­craft that will be built under Increment 1 of the pro­gram, with 23 improved heli­copters to be pro­duced under the follow-​​on Increment 2.

Lockheed Martin, prime con­trac­tor for the VH-​​71 pro­gram, is installing the first mis­sion sys­tems in two Increment 1 test vehi­cles, TV-​​3 and TV-​​4, at its pres­i­den­tial heli­copter inte­gra­tion facil­ity in Owego, New York. Another two heli­copters, TV-​​1 and TV-​​5, are con­tin­u­ing air-​​vehicle flight test­ing at the U.S Navy’s Patuxent River test cen­ter in Maryland.

Read the rest of this story, see how FCS is mov­ing for­ward, chart the sub­mersible drug catcher and explore the myths of Airlift from our Aviation Week friends at Military​.com.

– Christian

September 24th, 2008 | Av Week Extra | 40884 Comments »http://defensetech.org/2008/09/24/production-presidential-helicopter-flies/Production+Presidential+Helicopter+Flies2008-09-24+14%3A40%3A20Ward You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.