The Fight Over the Army’s Black Hawk Replacement
Non-partisan auditors are reviewing a U.S. Army decision that it would replace the Black Hawk helicopter with a new tiltrotor design. Lawmakers demand answers.
The prize: a decade of orders for the service’s utility aircraft of the future, with more than $70 billion set to flow to the prime contractor, its hundreds of suppliers, and their thousands of workers.
The Army was established in December. Choose Textron’s Bell V-280The aircraft can hover like a helicopter or fly like a fixed-wing airplane. Connecticut legislators were angered by this development, which was owned by Lockheed Martin-owned Sikorsky. Boeing and Black Hawk were partners in presenting the Defiant X helicopter. Its stacked rotors are a departure from the original. “pusher prop” This will allow it to fly at a much higher speed than the Black Hawk.
Right now, the public doesn’t know why the Army chose the V-280 over the Defiant X Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (or FLRAA) It’s common practice for the military not to say while losing bidders challenge the decision, which Sikorsky and Boeing Ende December.
The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office will decide whether the contract was fairly awarded, whether bids should have been re-evaluated or whether a new course of action should take place. It has until April.
The project is now on hold. But it hasn’t stopped ticked-off lawmakers from making their opinions known.
“Despite our delegation’s repeated requests, the Army unreasonably & irresponsibly has refused to provide us—or the public—with any information about why Sikorsky’s bid to build Future Long Range Assault Aircraft was rejected,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., Tweet Thursday.
“FYI yesterday the Army denied Congress’s request for a briefing – for the 4th time,” Tweet Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn. “Is this because the price of the Bell helicopter is sky high compared to the Sikorsky bid? Why doesn’t the Army want Congress to know this?”
Last week, Doug Bush, the Army’s top acquisition official, said the service built time for a protest into the project’s schedule.
“The Army’s confident, but you know, GAO will do its job and we’ll go from there,” He said.
But if the pro-Sikorsky-Boeing lawmakers choose, they could push for Congressional hearings or limit the project’s funding, which could ultimately delay the Black Hawk replacement. Or if any of the companies don’t like GAO’s recommendations, they could take their battle to court.
Mid-December saw Sikorsky, Boeing and the Army inform each other about their decision. This week, an industry source spoke about what the losing team considers flaws in the service’s acquisition process. The source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail the company’s concerns, said the Army was too subjective and inconsistent.
Sikorsky contends that its smaller Defiant X would be cheaper to operate and would not require the Army to pay to improve airfields to accommodate Bell’s larger aircraft.
“Sikorsky’s whole idea was to mimic what the Army does [now] to drive down the cost, to leverage the supply chain, to leverage the supply base, and give them something that’s affordable,” The source stated.
They claim that the helicopter would be less expensive to maintain in the long-term.
“When you make something transformational, make it fit into that footprint the absolute best you can,” The source stated.
The V-280 tiltrotor pilots would require more training than regular helicopter pilots. They would need to learn to fly fixed-wing planes and helicopters as well as tiltrotors. This is similar to the Marine Corps V-22 Osprey pilots.
A second industry source claimed that more realistic flight simulators could help reduce both the time and cost of training, as they can be used on the ground at a lower cost. Another source spoke on condition that he not be identified. A compound helicopter such as the Defiant X uses new technology, which would require Army pilots for some specialized training.
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Sikorsky & Boeing designed a helicopter that uses compound rotors. This eliminates the need to have a tail rotor. A pusher prop was installed to replace the tail rotor, allowing the helicopter to fly at high speeds as the Army requires. The Bell V-280, a tiltrotor aircraft, is a fixed-wing aircraft with movable tip rotors that allow it take off and land as a helicopter but fly quickly like a conventional plane.
“You have two different technologies that you’re trying to compare,” According to the first source.
The source stated that the Army used subjective criteria because of this.
“The criteria were applied subjectively, and we felt they were not applied consistently,” The source stated.
According to a source, the company wants the Army’s bids to be reexamined using more objective criteria. They assert that the Army officials’ hypothetical mission was not representative for the type of missions Army pilots have flown.
Sources said Lockheed Martin does not protest procurement decisions. The company believes the Army’s decision didn’t give “the best value to the Army to the taxpayer, for a lot of reasons.”
Bell and Sikorsky have much to lose. Sikorsky designs the Black Hawk helicopter, which is used by many militaries around world.
“Sikorsky is the incumbent manufacturer for the Army’s utility transport role as is the Black Hawk manufacturer,” Ray Jaworowski is an analyst at Forecast International. “Losing what’s essentially the eventual Black Hawk replacement is certainly a blow to the company.”
The Army intends to fly the helicopter into the next decade, and allies will continue to be able to do so.
“They’ll still be building Black Hawks for the Army, at least into the late 2020s, maybe even into the early 2030s,” Jaworowski stated. “Beyond that, they’ll still be building Black Hawks for export customers.”
Sikorsky produces the CH-53 heavy lift helicopters for Marine Corps. But, Sikorsky may be forced to cut its workforce by smaller Black Hawk orders.
“The Army’s FLRAA decision puts the defense industrial base at great risk by essentially scrapping decades of vertical flight experience,” Write Rocco Calo, chief officer of Teamsters Local 1450, the union that represents Sikorsky workers. “This stagnates helicopter development in the defense industry for the next 40-plus years, because these Teamster workers ARE the industrial base.”
The Army has more than 2,000 Black Hawks. Over the past four decades, Sikorsky built over 5,000 Black Hawks for the U.S. military as well as 35 allies.
“If the selection of the V-280 stands…the export market likely becomes increasingly important to them [and] they’ll have to reorient their product line a bit,” Jaworowski stated.
But the Defiant X isn’t necessarily dead even if GAO upholds the Army’s choice of the V-280. Jaworowski suggested that it could become a desirable option for U.S. allies in Europe, particularly as NATO is looking at it. It calls it The Next Generation Rotorcraft Capability is expected to be operational in the middle-to-late 2030s.
“It’s likely they’ll probably go to the European platform, but you could definitely see a teaming opportunity there for Sikorsky [and Boeing] to get involved…with technology from the Defiant X,” He said.
Bell is also in the same situation. It is expected that it will wrap up production of V-22 Osprey in the next years. This tiltrotor is used by both the Marine Corps (and the Air Force) and is larger than other tiltrotors. Japan is currently the only foreign buyer for V-22. That means without the new Army V-280 orders, the future of Bell’s military business would be in question.
“I would think the export opportunities would certainly be more numerous for the V-280 as the winner of the FLRAA program than they were for the V-22,” Jaworowski stated.
Sikorsky and Bell are also competing to build the Army’s Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft, a scout helicopter that would replace Bell’s OH-58 Kiowa, which the Army no longer flies. It is expected that the service will make its decision later in the decade. This is a smaller purchase than FLRAA, but the Army will likely make more of these aircraft.
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