USAF buys European MH-139 helicopters

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Boeing-Leonardo's MH-139

Boeing-Leonardo have won the USAF competition to replace its old UH-1N helicopters, serving since 1970s. As reported by Boeing

The winning helicopter is designated MH-139. It is a variant of Leonardo's AW139 design, a commercial helicopter in service since 2004, with some 900 airframes produced so far.

https://www.boeing.com/defense/mh-139/index.page

They beat Lockheed Martin Sikorsky team as well as Sierra Nevada Corporation, both of which had offered variants of UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter.

Most likely reason for the victory was much lower price tag. $2.38 billion, down from $4.1 billion which was the original USAF cost estimate for the procurement. Furthermore, operating costs over the lifetime are likely to be lower, compared to Black Hawk.

Said funds would buy 84 helicopters, with first two delivered in 2021.

Roles of both UH-1N and new helicopters include patrol over USAF's ICBM missile silos, as well as various VIP transport and utility missions.

The helicopter itself will be assembled for the most part in the US. The results of the competition may yet get contested, though. Back in 2008, KC-X winner was announced, which was at the time NG/EADS KC-30 based on Airbus A330, but was then contested and a new competition was organized.

Nevertheless, this is another instant of an European designed helicopter has won an US military contract. In 2006 Airbus (Then Eurocopter) won the Light utility helicopter with their EC145 design, which was named UH-72 Lakota in US Army service.

Overall impact of the MH-139 victory is still fairly small, in the grand scheme of US military procurement and US military-industrial complex. It's a fairly cheap program, compared to some other ones, the number of airframes isn't very high and overall visibility of the mission set USAF has for them makes them a low key asset.

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