Heli-Expo is the venue for the presentation of nine Salute to Excellence Awards, honoring the best and brightest in the helicopter industry. This year’s Appareo Pilot of the Year Award goes to New Zealand-born Jason Laing, a 6,400-hour helicopter pilot with more than 5,000 hours of mountain flying experience, along with NVG operations, SAR and firefighting skills. Operating from his home base in New Zealand, Laing has flown business, touring and missions in New Zealand, Australia, Antarctica, Kashmir (India) and Nepal. He is a highly respected high-altitude pilot who is often called upon for difficult mountain rescues.

Most recently, after a devastating avalanche at 19,000 feet on Mt. Everest in April 2014 that trapped some 30 climbers, Laing saved lives. He used an Airbus H125 (formerly the AS350B3e) outfitted with a 100-foot long line–doors and extra seating removed–to fly to the icefall at 20,000 feet. He lowered the line, and climbers on the ground strapped their injured colleagues to a stretcher. Laing lifted them in the air and flew them to safety. He single-handedly evacuated four injured Sherpas and 12 other victims.

A year later, in April 2015, a huge earthquake strong enough to move all of Mt. Everest two inches struck. “I’d just got back to my hotel and was getting ready to come into work,” Laing recalled. “I was on the sixth floor when the quake hit. The building didn’t fall down but it was extensively damaged. I was very lucky to get out alive.”

He headed straight to Kathmandu Airport and went up in one of the first helicopters dispatched to survey the damage. The day after the quake, Laing was tasked to fly reconnaissance to villages where all communications were lost. He discovered massive loss of life, and returned to base to begin a major rescue effort.

“We went up to the Langtang area. There were massive avalanches everywhere. It was total devastation. There were whole villages just gone,” he said. Next, he was sent to Mt. Everest’s Camps 1 and 2, where a collapsed icefall had trapped some 140 climbers.

In addition to the Appareo Pilot of the Year Award, Laing has been honored with the Kumar Khadga Bickram Adventurous Award from the Nepal Mountaineering Association and the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale Diploma for Outstanding Airmanship. He has most recently been working with the Himalayan Trust set up by Sir Edmund Hillary in 1960 in an effort to raise $50,000 to stage mountain rescue equipment at Everest above the ice falls, as well as to help rebuild Sherpa villages in Nepal.

Sikorsky’s Innovations group continues to progress on a spectrum of autonomous technologies as it preps its third optionally piloted helicopter for demonstration trials early next year. The company has been retrofitting a 1979 UH-60A obtained from the U.S. Army with a kit that incorporates its complete Matrix technology from full-authority control to other technologies that pave the way for autonomous missions. “We want to demonstrate the fact that you don’t have to design this technology in new aircraft. You can retrofit it in old aircraft and retrofit it in a reliable fashion,” said Igor Cherepinsky, chief of Sikorsky’s Autonomy Programs.

The aged Black Hawk is the next step of Sikorsky’s Matrix program, which has demonstrated a range of autonomous capabilities from technologies that assist the pilot to aircraft remotely controlled on the ground that can interface with remote-controlled ground vehicles.

The program, Cherepinsky said, is designed to look at “a spectrum of what is needed most for assistance. That goes anywhere from making current products safer and easier to fly…to automating missions where the pilot starts to become more of a mission operator or a mission manager.” Sikorsky is exploring possibilities where the operator could be in the back of the aircraft or on the ground.

“That is the spectrum of what we’re working on. It really isn’t just about the fact we hope to remote control our aircraft or fly without a human being on board,” he said.

“There are things we can do to enhance safety and reliability of helicopters and enable our pilots to do missions that we can’t do today,” added Mark Miller, v-p of research and engineering for Sikorsky Aircraft. Noting that helicopters operate in stressful obstacle-rich environments, he said the program is designed to address those challenges with built-in safety redundancies. “Our aircraft are critical assets. These are large-scale helicopters so it’s not like a drone where you have an acceptance of some rate of failure.”

Testing Under Way for Civil and Military Applications

The program has involved two test vehicles so far, the Sikorsky Autonomy Research Aircraft (SARA), a modified S-76, which has been flying since July 2013, and, a UH-60MU fly-by-wire helicopter that began trials in March 2014.

Equipped with a datalink and multi-spectral sensor package, the SARA aircraft is “really our flying lab for developing and maturing algorithms through hardware and …technology as a whole,” Cherepinsky said. The trials are “focusing on perception,” the ability to detect and avoid obstacles and operate in harsh conditions such as brownouts, he said. “We’ve developed a lot of sensing algorithms for things like landing zones and obstacle avoidance,” he added. This includes evaluating dynamic route planning, the ability to sense obstacles and reroute missions in real-time. Studies also have been under way on the man-to-machine interface.

The Black Hawk, meanwhile, initially conducted demonstrations of ground-control technologies to enable optionally piloted expeditionary operations and cargo resupply. More recently, Sikorsky teamed with Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) to demonstrate cooperative missions between the helicopter and CMU’s unmanned ground vehicle.

Miller has been encouraged that “the technology advances that we’ve made in this program have been significant. We’ve been very pleased with the pace at which we’re demonstrating a whole range of automation of different capabilities.”

Sikorsky has moved the first of the developed technologies into service, a software update for the S-92 that automates approaches to oil rigs. The technology brings the helicopter to a “standoff” distance of the rig and the pilot moves the helicopter over to final landing. FAA- and EASA-approved, the app “takes a very high-workload, higher-risk maneuver and makes it safer and highly repeatable,” Miller said.

This is the first of what the Sikorsky executives promise will be a series of technologies that will transfer into service, although for competitive reasons they are not specifying what might be next or when. But Miller said the company will “port” over the technologies as customers begin to accept the autonomous functions and certification authorities come on board. “Those are the big considerations. We are working that just as hard as if not harder than the actual technology,” he said.

Have you ever tried to navigate the inner city district of a complex metropolitan area? How about at night, or in IFR? If you have, then you know the challenges that downtown Boston, Mass., poses for air ambulance operators. Boston MedFlight, a nonprofit organization that provides transport regardless of the patient’s ability to pay, covers five hospitals interspersed among skyscrapers and other vertical obstacles, all located three miles or less from Boston’s Logan International Airport. Boston MedFlight transports upwards of 3,800 people a year, both on the ground and in the air. On average, the organization performs 150 aeromedical transports a month.

The group is being honored this year at Heli-Expo 2016 with the BLR Aerospace Safety Award for the work it did to address the problems in Boston, developing instrument approaches to the hospitals using GPS navigation. Boston MedFlight worked with the Infrastructure Team, as the government and industry group referred to itself, and over the course of five years the team designed the instrument approaches and got them FAA certified. After certification, the team had to work with air traffic controllers to train them on the new procedures and ensure that helicopters landing at or departing from the hospitals have minimal impact on arrivals and departures at Logan International, one of the nation’s busiest airports.

Final approval and authorization to begin using the new procedures came on Oct. 14, 2015. These approach procedures allow helicopters to land and depart from Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital, Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital (helipad also used by Boston Children’s Hospital), Boston Medical Center and Tufts Medical Center under marginal weather conditions.

“New England weather can be hazardous and largely unpredictable,” said Boston MedFlight CEO Suzanne Wedel. “This new instrument approach technology will allow us to more safely complete those transports that are within our capabilities. We are thrilled to have this new capability in our toolbox.”

It didn’t take long, with winter approaching, for validation of all that hard work. The first use of an aviation instrument approach procedure to the Brigham and Women’s Hospital helipad was 5:15 p.m. on November19, when a Boston MedFlight helicopter transporting a critically ill child executed the procedure to the helipad safely.

This multi-phase project will eventually connect outlying community hospitals across eastern Massachusetts with downtown Boston medical centers through a network of low-altitude instrument flyways that will allow Boston MedFlight helicopters to remain safely clear of other aviation traffic. MedFlight will now look to finalize GPS approaches to community hospitals, and share the developments with the Northeast Air Alliance, a consortium of all the medical helicopter providers from eastern New York to Maine.

Air medical transportation provider Metro Aviation (Booth 9337) strengthened its safety and operational support teams with the hiring of air medical safety veteran Ed Stockhausen and emergency services specialist Becky Ross.

Metro named Stockhausen director of safety. Stockhausen will oversee initiatives at Metro’s completion center in Shreveport, La., along with its 34 operational bases throughout the U.S. He will work to build upon the company’s existing safety practices. Metro has achieved Level IV of the FAA’s Safety Management System (SMS) Pilot Project for both Part 135 and 145.

Stockhausen brings a long background in aviation safety management. He has spent the past decade as v-p of safety for Air Methods, where he helped the operator also achieve SMS Level IV. He also has served as chairman of the Air Medical Operators Association’s Safety Committee and on HAI’s Safety Committee. He further has developed and presented courses for the Association of Air Medical Services. His career began in 1977 as crew chief and loadmaster for the U.S. Army Parachute Team, The Golden Knights.

Ross, meanwhile, becomes Metro’s second director of transport business services. Metro in May created the position with the hiring of Eveline Bisson to support its operational customers. In this role, Ross joins Bisson in providing support to Metro’s operational programs across the country.

Ross formerly was assistant v-p of emergency services for Vidant EastCare in Greenville, N.C. She also had worked with Metro this fall as a consultant for one of its operational customers that was experiencing major changes. She had stepped in as interim program director, while changes were implemented to put the operator on a stronger footing.

“The air medical industry has experienced significant change in the last few years,” said Metro president Mike Stanberry. “We want to make sure our customers not only survive in this changing climate, but excel and continue to provide their communities with the excellent service they have come to expect.”

Mitch Snyder assumed the helm as president and CEO of Bell Helicopter late last year following the resignation of John Garrison. Snyder had been part of the executive leadership team at Bell for the last five years, most recently heading its government business.

Snyder said not to expect any big changes at Bell under his administration. “I’m going to continue with the same strategy. I’ve been part of the executive leadership for five years, been at Bell for 12. You'll see increased emphasis on innovation. I mean that in terms of leaps in technology, not just incremental movements in terms of products, processes and services. Safety will always be at the core of all of those. The second focus will be on our people. They are what truly make us great. Bell is made up of a lot of great leaders. I’m going to expose a lot more leaders to everyone as opposed to just me singularly.”

Here at Heli-Expo, Bell is displaying the 525 Relentless flight test vehicle 2 (FTV 2), a 505 Jet Ranger X test vehicle, a 407 GXP configured for EMS, a 429 light twin configured for utility missions, and a mockup of its V-280 third-generation military tiltrotor, Bell's entry into the Army’s Joint Multi-Role Technology Demonstrator (JMR-TD) competition.

Snyder said the products on display convey Bell’s breadth, balance and commitment to innovation. Even in a challenging market, he said Bell will continue high levels of spending on innovation, research and development to both refresh existing products and bring transformative technologies to market. “We’re going to continue to do the product refreshes we’ve been doing, but we are putting a lot more emphasis into those big leaps in technology that are going to be the game changers. I won’t tell you exactly what we are working on, but we are going to be exploring a lot of new areas. We do have a list and we are working on them.”

Bell is increasing spending on R&D but Snyder declined to reveal the amount. He hinted that new models may be coming. “We’re putting a heavy emphasis on product refresh, but I really want to spend some money now on technology types. It could be a new airframe, a new clean-sheet [design] or an upgrade to an existing product. We will be increasing that spending. There are no time frames. When I say I’m thinking of some clean-sheet designs, that’s out in the future.”

While some have speculated that the V-280 could lead Bell back into the civil tiltrotor market, Snyder said Bell remains a committed supplier partner on the Finmeccanica (AgustaWestland) AW609 and focused on finding new markets for its V-22 military tiltrotor, made in partnership with Boeing. “We’re still part of the 609 program and are very supportive of Agusta to proceed with that,” he said. “What we are doing right now–300,000 flight hours on the V-22 and the most in-demand aircraft in the Marine Corps inventory–it is changing the way the world flies. Agusta is going to do extremely well, and we are very supportive in our partnership with them. Right now we are focused on what we are going to get done with the V-280 and the requirements for the JMR-TD and the Future Vertical Lift. We’ll see how things evolve and play out.”

Snyder called 2015 “a great year” for Bell. “There were geopolitical challenges and global economic uncertainty. But given all those situations, we had some great successes. We took one of our largest helicopter orders ever with 200 407 GXPs to Air Methods. Japan [ordered the] UHX for 150 aircraft based on the 412 EPi with Fuji Heavy Industries. [We now have] 350 LOIs for the Bell 505 and 75 LOIs for the Bell 525. The Navy selected the V-22 as [carrier onboard delivery], 40 aircraft. And Bell logged the first foreign military sales of the V-22 to Japan and the H-1Z to Pakistan.”

This year will see certification of the 505. Last July 1 525 FTV 1 made its first flight, and FTV 2 flew on December 21. Bell opened the new Bell Training Academy in Fort Worth and the 505’s Lafayette, La., assembly center last year.

Snyder thinks the market in 2016 will be similar to 2015. “We're going to continue to work on the balanced business model and invest in our new programs–the 505, 525 and V-280. The 525 will be certified in 2017 and the V-280 will be flying in 2017. We’re going to make sure we are cost-competitive globally.”

Snyder doesn't believe the recent collapse in global oil prices will hurt Bell as much as its competitors. “Even though the oil-and-gas market is struggling, we’re doing well and gaining share in other areas. Parapublic is an area that is growing, and we are doing well in emergency medical.” He declined to say how many of the 75 letters of intent for the new 525 super-medium twin are from oil-and-gas sector customers but did point out that the 525 “can do a lot of other things. There are multiple kits that can be installed on that aircraft–oil-and-gas, search-and-rescue and executive transport. All those kits will be in place [at certification]. Remember, oil-and-gas is down right now and may be down another year or two, but in three years we will have the product ready for when oil-and-gas comes back.”

Lockheed Martin's acquisition of Sikorsky will not affect Bell’s strategy going forward “at all,” Snyder said. “We continue to invest in commercial and the military. We are teamed with Lockheed Martin on the V-280 on the JMR-TD program with the next-generation tiltrotor. We continue to see great success with that program and have a great relationship with Lockheed Martin working on that. Given our portfolio and our long-term contracts with the U.S. government on the military side with the V-22 and the H-1Y/Z, I don’t think their acquisition of Sikorsky impacts us at all.”

On the eve of the start of Heli-Expo 2016 in Louisville, Helicopter Association International president Matt Zuccaro remains bullish about the status of the industry, despite the definite headwinds faced by some sectors.

“One thing I think we all realize and acknowledge is the offshore industry right now is not performing the way we would like it to,” Zuccaro told AIN on Sunday at the Kentucky Exposition Center, noting the recent slump in rotorcraft usage and postponed orders due to depressed energy prices. “I’ve been doing this long enough that in effect this has happened previously and the good news to this story is we’ve always recovered and come back stronger.”

While that specific segment has encountered a sustained slowdown, Zuccaro noted increases in sectors such as air medical and air tours among others, which have helped buoy the industry somewhat on the aggregate and allowed operators to seek new opportunities. “They’ve moved into other areas of business in order to keep those aircraft active and to keep their personnel employed, flying and maintaining,” he said. “They’re doing what we do best; we’re survivors and we take advantage of the versatility of the aircraft to do other missions while waiting for their main segments to recover.”

Government Issues

With regards to the current debate on FAA reauthorization and user fees, Zuccaro has strong views on the prospect of the air traffic control system being placed in the hands of an airline-dominated corporation and how the funding for the whole industry might be affected. “A classic example of this is there’s funds that we’re able to get from the federal government to do such wonderful projects such as NextGen and the ADS-B system in the Gulf of Mexico,” Zuccaro noted. “Does anyone really think that the scheduled airlines are going to allocate money for a project like that for helicopters?” Like many opposed to the proposed plan, he believes that if something is not broke, why fix it? “I find it quite odd that the air traffic control system is acknowledged by everybody no matter who you ask as the safest and most efficient in the world,” he said. “If that’s the case then why are we doing this?

“I’m very comfortable with the fact that I can [today] go to Congress and go to the FAA and have a conversation with them about the concerns of the helicopter industry and I know that I am talking to an impartial person with no conflict of interest.”

New this year, HAI, in partnership with ICAO has introduced a new IS-BAH-based voluntary safety accreditation program for rotorcraft operators. “On top of that foundation, HAI itself developed individual mission-specific standards,” added Zuccaro, who said they will eventually address all the types of missions the association’s members perform. Since its launch at the beginning of the year, four of the association’s members have certified and will be formally recognized here at the show, while others are currently in the audit process. “It’s been accepted initially, which we’re thrilled with, and we hope it raises the standard of safety within the industry,” said Zuccaro, adding that the association does not view the standard as a new revenue source. Rather, it is administering it at cost. “That is our sole purpose as an aggregate program.”

Heli-Expo Lands in Louisville

Heli-Expo has grown significantly over the past seven years, according to Matt Zuccaro, becoming too big for at least two popular locations, and it threatens to outgrow others in the coming years, thus leading HAI to search for new alternatives. The HAI president had nothing but praise for the Louisville venue and the city leaders’ eagerness to work with the association to conduct a successful show. “When we go to cities one of the elements that we look for is what’s the partnership relationship, how much is the city going to support us and our attendees and exhibitors,” Zuccaro said. “The level that we’ve received in the venue here has been phenomenal, one of the best I’ve ever experienced.” Among the appreciated efforts from the Kentucky Exposition Center was the construction of a fully approved permanent heliport behind the center, which was used to land the 55 rotorcraft on display here in this year’s show.

BLR Aerospace completed proof-of-concept flight tests of its FastFin tailrotor enhancement and stability system on the Airbus Helicopters H125 (AS350B3e) last year. Now the company expects to complete flight testing and to receive FAA certification for the product later this year, with approvals by EASA and Brazil’s ANAC to follow.

Dave Marone, BLR v-p of sales and marketing, told AIN that BLR bought an AS350B3e last year to do the proof-of-concept work on the helicopter. “Working together with Airbus Helicopters on development of the system was significant and accelerated development of the program,” he explained.

BLR’s AS350B3e with the FastFin is undergoing flight testing, so is not being displayed here at Heli-Expo. The test program showed that FastFin improves wind-azimuth tolerance and increased useful load in a hover. Detailed performance data will be provided after certification, when FastFin will be offered as an aftermarket modification and as an option on new H125s.

Separately, BLR announced that 1,000th FastFins are flying on helicopters in 35 countries. The 1,000th FastFin went to Agrarflug of Ahlen, Germany, for a Bell 212 on January 29.

In 2005, an AS350B3 flown by one test pilot broke the world record for the highest-altitude landing and takeoff, performed on Mount Everest at 29,035 feet (8,850 meters). Perhaps Airbus Helicopters will attempt to exceed this record with a FastFin-equipped H125 with two pilots on board.

Brazil’s troubled, scandal-plagued and majority state-owned oil company Petrobras announced January 12 that it is revising its planned capital expenditures–including deepwater exploratory drilling–lower for the period 2015 to 2019 from $130 billion to $98.4 billion and modestly cutting oil production targets as well. The move is expected to have a major impact on the country’s already buffeted OGP helicopter services firms, which have seen business decline by more than 25 percent over the last year. Petrobras accounts for 90 percent of all OGP helicopter business in Brazil.

Brazil, once seen as the darling of new heavy and medium helicopter sales due to expanding deepwater energy business, is now headed for a deep sales freeze. OGP helicopter providers had already taken aggressive moves to defer or cancel deliveries. Last year Lider Aviação put the brakes to the delivery of six Sikorsky S-92s and several smaller helicopters. And the Brazilian real lost 38 percent of its value against the U.S. dollar; almost all aviation transactions are done in dollars. Two years ago Lider was flying 45 helicopters for Petrobras. At the end of last year it was down to 35.

The worst may be far from over. A slew of institutional investors are suing Petrobras over a corruption scandal known as Lava Jato (“car wash”) involving company executives, contractors and politicians that may have stripped the company of as much as $28 billion, of which it wrote off $17 billion. Some 2,000 Petrobras employees are under investigation, according to litigation brought by investors. One lawsuit, brought by bond firm Pacific Investment Management Co. (Pimco), charges that top Petrobras executives were aware of the corruption scheme and therefore that “calls into question the integrity of the company as a whole.” Investment firms and public pension funds across the U.S. are joining in on the litigation train while there is still money left to get.

Petrobras’s total debt last year reached $134 billion, and the value of much of that debt has been cut to junk status by rating services Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s, and increasingly markets are doubtful of its ability to pay. In an effort to reassure markets, Petrobras said in early 2015 it was selling off $15 billion worth of assets in 2015 and 2016 to help pay down debt, but to date has managed to dispose of only $700 million. Petrobras has lost $190 billion in market capitalization over the last five years and during the past year its stock has tumbled more than 60 percent. The sliding price of oil pushed company revenues down 27 percent year to date, and the company is abrogating contracts with drillers and suppliers as fast as it can whenever and wherever it can. And no drilling means no helicopters.

While there is some concern that Petrobras could default on multibillion-dollar loan payments due in 2016 and 2017, it seems unlikely that the Brazilian government would allow it, classifying the company as too big to fail. But when and if OGP helicopter activity stabilizes and begins to grow again remains an open question. As does the executive and charter helicopter market in the remainder of the country which, due to declining economic conditions, has also taken a hit, down approximately 25 percent or more in leading markets including São Paulo.

Of the nine Salute to Excellence Awards distributed each year during Heli-Expo, the Sikorsky Humanitarian Service Award stands out because it honors those who use helicopters for the missions that Igor Sikorsky first envisioned: saving lives. The Italian coast guard’s 2nd Nucleo Aereo; the Italian navy’s Gruppo Elicotteri 1 and Gruppo Elicotteri 3; and the Italian air force’s 15th Stormo 84th and 15th Stormo 85th Centro CSAR were awarded the Sikorsky Humanitarian Service award during Heli-Expo 2016, for their part in a massive marine helicopter rescue mission off the coast of Italy in the last days of 2014.

On Dec. 28, 2014, the car ferry Norman Atlantic had just left a Greek port with approximately 487 passengers, 200 vehicles and 12 crew aboard, bound for Southern Italy, when a fire broke out on the car deck.

The Italian-flagged ferry, chartered by Greek ferry operator Anek Lines, was sailing from Patras in western Greece to Ancona in Italy. Just 15 days earlier Greek authorities had cited the owner for numerous safety violations relating to emergency lighting, fire doors and lifesaving capacity on board the vessel. The owners had been served with a notice giving them 15 days to remedy the deficiencies.

The flames spread quickly among the gasoline- and diesel-filled cars and trucks on two decks, yet no alarm sounded, according to passengers. Heat and smoke chased passengers and crew out onto open decks where they were pummeled by howling winds and rain. Hypothermia was rampant. Only one lifeboat, with 49 aboard, was launched. Flames and smoke swamped the others.

The fire burned out of control through the night. By morning the ship listed, bellowing black smoke, adrift in heavy seas and gale-force winds. Rescue teams faced dense smoke, rough seas and high flames fanned by winds of more than 40 knots, which made a ship-to-ship rescue impossible. Two crew were killed during the attempt to rig towing cables to the vessel.

As the ferry burned, five helicopter units from the Italian air force, navy, and coast guard mounted one of the largest marine helicopter rescue missions ever attempted. While fireboats sprayed water on the flames in an attempt to put the fire out, the helicopters airlifted first the injured, then the youngest and most vulnerable passengers and finally all of the crew to safety over the course of 72 hours. When it was done, although a dozen people lost their lives, more than 420 passengers and crew were airlifted by the Italians from the Norman Atlantic to nearby ships taking part in the rescue effort. The exact number airlifted is complicated by the fact that numerous stowaways were onboard, making the passenger manifest reference material, at best.

The ferry was eventually towed via tug to Brindisi, Italy, when the weather died down. It continued to smolder for days as firefighters fought hotspots and searched for more stowaways inside the superstructure.

Erickson (Booth 9251) has signed new deals for an additional Aircrane heli-tanker in Australia and another for timber harvesting operations in Canada.

Erickson’s Australian partner Kestrel Aviation signed up for a third S64E Aircrane to support firefighting efforts in Victoria state. Erickson has six Aircranes currently working in Australia. “We are proud to help protect the lives and homes of Victoria’s residents during the peak of their fire season,” said Andy Mills, Erickson v-p of commercial aviation services. “Our crews have already been busy fighting fires in Western Australia and New South Wales.” The third Aircrane, previously stationed in Sydney, New South Wales to fight fires, has been reassigned to Mangalore, Victoria where it remains available as required for the remainder of the fire season.

The S64 Aircrane heli-tanker can hold and drop 2,650 gallons of water on fires in a single pass. Specialized snorkels enable the Aircrane to also refill the tank in nearby bodies of water in less than 30 seconds.

Columbia Helicopters (Booth 10337) subsidiary Helifor Canada renewed its contract with Erickson for year-round services using an Aircrane for aerial timber harvesting in British Columbia and western Canada. This is the fifth time that Helifor has renewed its contract with Erickson, and the contract lasts until Dec. 31, 2016. Erickson is providing pilots, field maintenance support crews, parts and components. The contract also includes an option to add another Aircrane.

“Erickson has operated in Canada for more than 30 years,” said Mills. “Aerial timber harvesting is where we began as a company, and we are pleased to continue that tradition with Helifor.”

Even after the recent restructuring of parent company Finmeccanica, the AgustaWestland brand will still be much in evidence at this week’s Heli-Expo show. From January 1, the group has been organized under four sectors, including the new Finmeccanica Helicopter Division along with aeronautics, defense and security systems and space.

In an interview ahead of HeliExpo, Helicopter Division CEO Daniele Romiti told AIN that the restructuring and renaming will not cause any disruption to the service its AgustaWestland customers receive. He characterized the move as necessary to make the various businesses more coherent and competitive in an aerospace and defense market that he described as “the battle of the giants.” In this regard, the changes mirror consolidation that has already happened within the rival Airbus, Textron (Bell) and Sikorsky/Lockheed Martin groups.

Still to be fully resolved is the future of established brands under the new Finmeccanica monolith. Giovanni Soccodato, executive vice president for strategy, markets and business development, indicated that AgustaWestland’s helicopters might not be the only products permitted to keep trading on their history and reputation. In fact, a Finmeccanica board meeting later this month [March] is due to consider proposals for a new permanent name for the restructured group, with a spokesman indicating to AIN that the Finmeccanica moniker may just be a working title.

Beyond the Oil Shock

According to Romiti, Finmeccanica’s helicopter business is well placed to survive the well-documented market disruption to the offshore sector caused by the collapsing price of oil. “No one can predict what will happen to the oil price, but our customers need us to help them reduce the cost of [helicopter] ownership and this can be achieved by replacing older, larger aircraft with smaller, more efficient models,” he commented.

So far, said Romiti, Finmeccanica has received only requests to postpone deliveries of new helicopters, rather than order cancellations. He expects new models like the AW119, the latest version of the AW109, the AW169 and AW189 to be in more demand now that the business case for more efficient equipment is even more compelling.

Looking beyond these types, Romiti portrayed the AW609 tiltrotor as “a quantum leap” that will prove popular with a variety of operations. The ability to transition between vertical lift and fixed-wing service promises to transform the viability of a wide variety of operations. For instance, Finmeccanica executives could use the aircraft to make the 900-mile trip from its Cascina Costa headquarters, north of Milan, to the group’s UK offices in Yeovil in two hours 14 minutes–an attractive option compared to the limited scheduled airline services between the two sites.

Finmeccanica is now working closely with ICAO to agree the regulations that will cover tiltrotor operations. It hopes these will include specially designated approach paths that will allow the aircraft to fulfill its potential for cost effective operations. 

Conklin & de Decker (Booth 5935) has released the latest edition of its Life Cycle Cost software, Release 16.1, which now incorporates the data and five-year condensed format option from the Aircraft Cost Analysis program that Conklin & de Decker acquired from Sam Miller in 2014. The five-year condensed report allows users to run a comparison of three different aircraft side-by-side or the same aircraft, but using three different acquisition forms.

Life Cycle Cost features ownership and operating cost data for more than 460 jets, turboprops, helicopters and piston-powered airplanes. Version 16.1 includes more than 7,000 updated aircraft cost points, among them fuel costs, crew salaries, aircraft inspections, overhauls and retirement items plus updated engine and acquisition costs. The 16.1 release also incorporates pie charts and bar graphs. Subscribers to Life Cycle Cost can access the Conklin & de Decker Aviation Resource Library, which includes information such as fuel and maintenance costs, fleet plan checklist, helicopter seating chart, max range at long-range cruise, aircraft alias and engine installation summaries, aircraft variable cost, the aircraft CO2 calculator and the AircraftPedia, which offers interior and exterior aircraft drawings and color images, histories and general cost, performance and engine information.

In mid-February the company released the 2016 version of its State Tax Guide for General Aviation with updates, definitions and exemptions researched and analyzed by Conklin & de Decker partner and tax guru Nel Stubbs.

Here at Heli-Expo Conklin & de Decker is demonstrating a pre-release of the latest version of its maintenance tracking software, MxManager, a Windows-based tool for tracking, organizing and controlling maintenance activities and expenses, for fixed- or rotary-wing aircraft. Several years in the making, this new version is “orders of magnitude faster,” according to the company.

At its Heli-Expo booth, the firm is giving away a GoPro action camera. Visitors can purchase Conklin & de Decker products at a 10 percent Heli-Expo show discount.

After the show, company co-founder Bill de Decker will lead the Managing Aircraft Operating Costs advanced helicopter operator course, to be held from March 3 through 5 in the Kentucky International Convention Center. Then on March 14, Conklin & de Decker will host the same seminar for airplane and helicopter operators in Toluca, Mexico.

Advocacy, service and compassion are just three attributes that earned Lt. Pat Lawrence this year’s MD Helicopters Law Enforcement Award at Heli-Expo 2016. Without top cops such as Lt. Pat Lawrence, the ground-based units in Michigan’s largest metropolitan areas would lose a huge tactical advantage over the bad guys.

Lawrence enlisted with the department in 1994, graduating as a member of the 110th Trooper Recruit School. He was assigned to the Caro Post and transferred to the aviation unit in 1999. Lawrence has also served as a pilot with the Michigan National Guard for 30 years.

In 2008 Lawrence was chief pilot and commander of the Michigan State Police aviation unit. His leadership was instrumental in rebuilding the unit after the economic downturn. During that time the unit dropped from five helicopters and three airplanes to just two helicopters and three pilots, at a time when the crime rate in Michigan’s three most populous metro areas exploded.

Lawrence established a schedule to patrol Detroit, Flint and Saginaw on a nightly basis, rotating the duty among the three remaining pilots and two helicopters. In that time period Lawrence flew more than 1,000 hours patrolling the cities and flying other missions, including search-and-rescue, marijuana eradication and disaster response. As a flight instructor in both fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft, Lawrence was able to keep costs down for the unit and hire, and then train, two new pilots in 2014. He also established a tactical flight officer training program.

During those tough years Lawrence did not succumb to apathy about the challenges and limitations the economic downturn had dealt his department. Instead he vigorously lobbied state lawmakers to expand the state police aviation unit. He took the governor and several state legislators on demonstration flights to show them firsthand why the state desperately needed aviation law enforcement assets.

Lawrence’s efforts were finally rewarded in 2015 when the Michigan legislature approved and purchased a third law enforcement helicopter. Most recently he played an active role in the department’s purchase and authorization to fly an unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which established the Michigan State Police as one of the first police agencies in the nation to successfully obtain statewide flight authorization from the FAA for UAS law enforcement missions.

Troy Lewis was honored this week during Heli-Expo 2016 with the Rolls-Royce Excellence in Helicopter Maintenance Award, as part of HAI’s Salute to Excellence, which recognizes and honors those who present the helicopter industry in its best light. The awards cross the spectrum, from communications, law enforcement, safety, and maintenance to humanitarian service and lifetime achievement.

Lewis is the area training manager for engine manufacturer Turbomeca USA. He began his aviation maintenance career in 1986 with Arlington, Texas-based Inter-Turbine as a quality control inspector. He then joined Turbomeca’s quality department. During his tenure there, he was instrumental in establishing a number of programs that have saved the company hundreds of thousands of dollars.

“When I started my career at Turbomeca USA in 1991 it was a much smaller company,” Lewis told AIN. “This gave all of us an opportunity to learn many aspects about our engines as we all had to cover many different areas of the MRO and production process.”

During 20-plus years at Turbomeca, Lewis has trained thousands of aviation maintenance technicians annually, both at the company’s Arlington training center and at customers’ maintenance facilities. “We have a great instructor network, and with that I think we all bring a great deal to the table and mentor each other,” Lewis said.

He became a customer-training instructor in 2008, and in 2014 was named lead instructor. As lead instructor, in addition to his regular teaching duties, Lewis is responsible for instructor audits, recurrent training and qualifications and for mentoring instructors in Turbomeca’s training network. “I enjoy when I can pass along historical information to a fellow instructor to give them a background of why a service bulletin or technical document came to be on an engine,” he said.

Lewis earned the Rolls-Royce award this year because of his knack for communicating clearly, sensing each student’s knowledge level and getting the information to them in a professional manner.

“The advice Igive to students and those I mentor is that you must have passion. If you have a great passion for your job then it doesn’t really feel like a job at all,” Lewis said. “I feel very strongly about a famous philosophical quote: ‘What I hear I forget; what I see, I remember; what I do, I understand.’”

It has been a challenging year for helicopter operators flying in and out of the East Hampton Airport (KHTO) in eastern New York. In April the town board past a trio of restrictions limiting operations. The first is a weekly limit on flights of any aircraft with an approach noise signature louder than 91 EPNdB (effective perceived noise level in decibels), a restriction that covered most rotorcraft, but this was thrown out by the district court. However, two “shoulder curfews” covering those aircraft were adopted and upheld, effectively forbidding access after 8 p.m. or before 9 a.m.

The broader curfew’s impact was to shift much of the East Hampton helicopter traffic to seaplanes to beat the noise restrictions; seaplane traffic to the airport was up 76 percent this season, driven by the services tied to travel apps Uber and Blade. Meanwhile helicopter traffic, which should have grown due to association with those apps, remained flat, according to Jeff Smith of the Eastern Region Helicopter Council (ERHC).

Meanwhile the new curfews have done nothing to assuage the helicopter noise complainers, who continue to inveigh against traffic transitioning to East Hampton from the mandatory FAA-imposed North Shore route. Ironically, the North Shore route was established for voluntary compliance in 2008 as a response to residential noise complaints and political prodding from elected officials, including U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), who pressed then transportation secretary Ray LaHood and the FAA to make it mandatory. The FAA did so in August 2012 (FAR 93.103 A&B), with a two- year sunset provision. The FAA chose to renew it for another two years in August 2014, and it has the option to renew it again this August.

The ERHC will begin in March to work with the impacted communities to disperse the transition routes, Smith said. “We’re going to continue our fly-neighborly program and work with the impacted communities,” Smith said. Meanwhile, the issue of helicopter noise continues to be prime political fodder. U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin (R) who represents the Hamptons in Congress, favors dispersing the transition routes, while his likely general election opponent, Southampton town supervisor Anna Throne-Holst, wants the heavy hand of Congress to make the FAA impose a solution. She told a citizens’ meeting last summer, “The FAA needs to be held accountable and needs to be brought to the table. It requires an act of Congress.”

Throne-Holst also wants a mandatory South Shore Route, a routing that would send more helicopter traffic bound for East Hampton and Gabreski (KFOK) over residential areas and that could dramatically increase the number of helicopter noise complaints.

Global helicopter operator and manufacturer Erickson is utilizing its capabilities in support of the U.S. Navy’s heavy lift rotorcraft fleet. The Oregon-based company (Booth 9251) recently delivered the last of five spare tail pylon units for the CH-53E Super Stallion, the largest helicopter operated by the service. Erickson was contracted by Sikorsky, now owned by Lockheed Martin, to build the out-of-production assemblies at its facility at Central Point, Ore.

“Erickson is increasingly a trusted provider of contemporary maintenance and repair services, which this project exemplifies,” noted company president and CEO Jeff Roberts. “Our extensive history with the Sikorsky aircraft specifically enables us to perform this important work for the U.S. Marine Corps.” Erickson purchased the type certificate of the former Sikorsky S-54 (CH-54) heavy lift helicopter, a contemporary of the CH-53, in 1992 and is now the world’s largest operator of the type. In addition to remanufacturing legacy airframes it is now building new versions of the iconic S-64E Air-Crane.

Erickson further leveraged that experience when it was selected as a subcontractor by Adams Communication and Engineering Technologies (ACET) to refurbish a pair of MH-53E Sea Dragon helicopters. It is the first contract awarded by the U.S. Navy to a commercial contractor for a depot-level maintenance event of an MH-53E, according to Kerry Jarandson, the company’s vice president of MRO and manufacturing. Work on the first helicopter began last month at Erickson’s facility at Rogue Valley International Airport in Medford, Ore. “Erickson is pleased to partner with ACET in support of this project, said Roberts. “We take great pride in assisting the U.S. Navy to enhance their fleet capabilities.”

Eileen Frazer, executive director of the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems (CAMTS), accepted the Airbus Helicopters Golden Hour Award at Heli-Expo 2016. Twenty-five years ago Frazer founded CAMTS, and she has led the organization, dedicated to improving the safety and quality of both air- and ground-based medical transportation, ever since.

In the mid-1980s, Frazer was an emergency room nurse who chaired the safety committee of what is now the Association of Air Medical Services. The committee drafted criteria for peer review safety audits that were designed to address a critical problem: the increase in air ambulance accidents.

Frazer and the committee felt the peer review audits should be performed by an independent organization. In 1988 and 1989, Frazer did a feasibility study, modeling an ideal audit organization on the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, which accredits hospitals. Frazer subjected the standards developed by the committee to an extensive public comment process and published them as CAMTS standards in 1991.

Today CAMTS is made up of 20 nonprofit organizations, each represented on the board of directors, and all of which are dedicated to improving the quality and safety of medical transport services. The accreditation standards address issues of patient care and safety in fixed- and rotary-wing services as well as ground inter-facility services that provide critical care transport. Each standard is supported by measurable criteria that can reasonably assess a program's quality.

Revisions to the standards over time are a direct reflection of the dynamic, changing environment of medical transport and, according to Frazer, are made only with considerable input from all disciplines of the medical air transport profession.

CAMTS offers a voluntary audit of compliance with its accreditation standards, but earning CAMTS accreditation isn’t an easy matter. A medical transport service must substantially comply with the standards of the organization before accreditation will be issued, according to Frazer. Services striving for accreditation can submit progress reports to CAMTS as their operations’ deficiencies (found during audit) are corrected.

With all of the challenges medical air transportation is up against today, accreditation helps organizations stand out as a seal of quality and safety. There are now 184 CAMTS-accredited air ambulance programs in the U.S. and six countries around the world, and that number is growing as CAMTS completes, on average, 75 new or reaccreditation applications every year.

International aviation insurance specialist Global Aerospace has launched a user-friendly online aviation underwriting and policy management portal, which is dedicated to the light aircraft market, including kit, experimental and amateur-built aircraft. According to the company, brokers that have previously used PBO-online, Aeroinsure UK or Canada.Net will find the portal to be a reliable and continuously improving e-commerce system, which will operate across multiple product lines globally.

At its booth here at Heli-Expo (6060), the London-based provider will demonstrate the new system, which it says will provide easy access to light aircraft insurance. Among its benefits are quick online quotes and immediate coverage, secure encryption of online data, less paperwork and competitive premiums. “Aeroinsure is another example of Global’s increased investment in technology in order to make aviation insurance simpler and more convenient,” noted Nick Brown, the company’s group chief executive.

Finmeccanica Helicopters is stressing the lighter portion of its portfolio of AW models here at Heli-Expo in the wake of continuing softness in the offshore energy market. “We want to show the versatility of our product portfolio and have invested in new products at the right time that have come to market in a timely fashion. There is a general worry about the oil-and-gas downturn. We started deliveries of the AW169 [medium twin] in 2015 [and that model is] intended to address different market segments, mostly EMS, VIP and other light utilities,” said Stefano Bortoli, Finmeccanica Helicopters senior vice president for sales and strategic sourcing.

Bortoli said he expects the AW169 to receive FAA certification in mid-2016 and noted that the manufacturer already holds orders from 50 customers in 20 countries. Work is proceeding on developing a search-and-rescue variant with Swiss operator Rega, and it will feature a full icing protection system (FIPS). Of the AW169s on order, most have been ordered by helicopter EMS operators; the second largest group of orders is for VIP configurations.

Deliveries of the AW169 began in 2015 after it received EASA approval. Plans call for the model to be manufactured in Italy and at Finmeccanica’s plant in Philadelphia, with deliveries beginning from the latter in 2017.

Finmeccanica will be displaying its new AW Trekker light twin this year. The Trekker is a skidded version of the company’s AW109S Grand. Deliveries of the Trekker are scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of this year. More than 20 Trekkers were sold in 2015. The aircraft features the same cabin as the Grand and advanced single-pilot-IFR Garmin G1000H avionics, but costs less. Bortoli called the price difference “meaningful” and said it “will be appreciated by our customers.

The Trekker is powered by a pair of Fadec-equipped Pratt & Whitney Canada PW207C 815-shp engines that deliver a maximum cruise speed of 154 knots. It has a maximum takeoff weight of 7,000 pounds and will have an endurance of four hours, 20 minutes or a 445-nm maximum range with a modular five-cell fuel system. It will be assembled at Finmeccanica’s plant in Philadelphia.

Bortoli said the company planned to announce news regarding the company’s AW119Kx single at the show. Last year Finmeccanica joined with the Bristow Group, Doss Aviation, and Rockwell Collins to develop a turnkey solution using the AW119Kx to address the rotary-wing pilot training needs of the U.S. military and other government customers. The AW119 is assembled in Philadelphia. The AW119Kx features the Garmin G1000H flight deck system with synthetic vision, moving-map, highway-in-the-sky and obstacle/terrain avoidance systems. U.S.-based Life Flight Network was the launch customer, initially acquiring 15 of the helicopters in EMS configuration.

Finmeccanica will also be displaying the AW 009 light single, the rebranded SW-4 originally developed by Polish airframer PZL-Swidnik beginning in 1981. The design first flew in 1996 and has undergone several refinements since Finmeccanica acquired a majority stake in the company in 2009. Bortoli said recent improvements include new Genesis avionics, an improved hydraulics system and a reduced level of vibration. Bortoli said he is confident Finmeccanica could keep the 009 priced less than $2 million. The 113-knot 009 is powered by the Rolls-Royce 250-C20R/2 and has an mtow of 3,968 pounds.

“The reason we are proposing it under this new name is that we have a business case we consider solid and we are confident we can deliver a product in a price range that is palatable to the market based on a market survey we did in 2015. This is an attractive product and attractive price,” Bortoli said.

Even with the depressed oil-and-gas market, Finmeccanica’s larger helicopter offerings continue to do well. Bortoli noted that the company already had delivered 30 of its AW189 super-medium helicopters including one in VIP configuration to a Middle Eastern customer and that it is working on additional VIP configurations for that model. He characterized early customer comments about the AW189 as “very positive.” Bortoli also said that the medium-twin AW139 continues to sell well, with nearly 800 delivered and 900 sold in a variety of configurations including commercial, military, law enforcement, EMS, VIP and oil-and-gas. Overall the AW139 fleet has amassed more than 1.4 million hours.

Work continues on the AW609 civil tiltrotor program in the wake of the fatal crash of the second prototype Oct. 30, 2015. Flight operations have been stood down on the remaining flyable prototype since the accident, but Bortoli said the company hopes to have it back in the air as early as this month and was continuing work on two additional prototypes, albeit at a slower pace. Its technology-sharing agreement with the Bristow Group, to develop an oil-and-gas/search-and-rescue variant also remained in place. “We are continuing to work on the program,” Bortoli said. “We are very committed to its development. We are continuing to work with the Bristow team. We are confident that once we restart it at full speed and start flying again, the 609 will be our flagship program going forward, but investigations are still ongoing and we have to be respectful of the work being undertaken by the various authorities involved.”

MD Helicopters (MDHI) bolstered its military business with the signing of a launch customer for its MD 530G scout attack helicopter. The Malaysia Ministry of Defense signed a contract to take delivery of six of the upgraded model. Plans call for MDHI to begin delivery of the helicopters to Malaysian army aviation, Pasukan Udara Teneter Darat(PUDT), late this year with all six to be handed over the end of the first quarter of 2017.

The MD 530G first flew in 2013 and MDHI formally announced the helicopter and completed live-fire testing a year later. The next in line to the 530F that was certified more than 30 years ago, the 530G is fitted with more robust landing gear to support a 3,750-pound mtow that increases payload for range, endurance and weapons. The helicopter has a top speed of 130 knots.

The aircraft is configured to accommodate an integrated on-board stores management system, FLIR, guided and unguided rockets and inboard .50 caliber machine guns. The Malaysian army’s fleet of MD 530G helicopters will be equipped with a custom weapons package, advanced communications capabilities and electro-optical/infrared sensors to detect a range of threats.

The Malaysian contract is the second for announced this year for MDHI’s scout helicopters. The company in January announced a follow-on contract to deliver 12 more of its 530F Cayuse Warrior scout attack helicopters with enhanced mission equipment to the Afghan air force.

MD Helicopters delivered the first 12 MD 530F Cayuse Warrior helicopters to the Afghan air force in support of the 2015 fighting season. Delivery of those helicoptersbegan in March 2015. Also, five other MD 530Fs that were used as primary training aircraft have been upgraded to the Cayuse Warrior configuration.

“The MD 530F has played an integral role in building the capabilities of the Afghan air force and the Afghan national defense and security forces since the first aircraft arrived in Shindand in 2011,” said MDHICEO Lynn Tilton. “In both training and combat configurations, the fleet has consistently maintained a mission launch rate of greater than 97 percent.”

MDHI also marked several smaller key wins for its 530F over the past year in other government and civilian sectors, including orders from police departments in Mesa, Ariz.; Las Vegas and Fresno County, Calif. Police departments in Gwinnett County, Ga., and Columbus, Ohio, took re-delivery of helicopters upgraded to the 530F configuration. Also taking delivery of a new 530F was Two Bear Air Rescue in Whitefish, Mont.

Those orders capped off a year that began with Tilton anticipating growth across its market segments, continuing the rebound of the company that faced shuttering a decade ago.