Originally Posted by SASless
Hot/High, Long Distance, heavy payloads....so what is the competition in that contest?
The 101, NH-90, Belvedere or the venerable Chinook?
Halo aside, I guess the answer is multiple Chinooks. Just as the CH-47F was the default platform in Afghanistan for lifting Black Hawk-sized payloads at 10,000 ft HLZs, the CH-53K will be able to lift CH-47-sized payloads at high altitudes, albeit at a price.
The current CH-47F can carry 16k lb @ 4K/95F, while the CH-53K's baseline requirement is 27k lb @ 3K/95F (with an objective requirement of 30k lb @ 3K/95F). The Block II CH-47F will close the gap slightly, but the CH-53K will remain king of the hill, thanks in no small part to its 22,500 shp of installed power.
(Let's see what happens when Boeing
sticks a couple of T408s in the CH-47.
)
I/C