Australia dumps troubled European-designed Taipan helicopters for US Black Hawks and Seahawks

The Australian Defence Force will ditch its entire fleet of troubled European-designed Taipan helicopters a decade earlier than scheduled, replacing them with new Black Hawks and Seahawks imported from the United States.

Key points:

Defence will scrap all 47 European-designed Taipans used by Army and Navy
The ADF's Taipans have been plagued with poor availability and fleet-wide groundings
The decision comes three months after Australia ditched the French submarine program

Defence Minister Peter Dutton is due to announce today that the Army will follow Navy's decision to replace its locally produced Airbus MRH-90 Taipans with off-the-shelf Sikorsky-manufactured helicopters, in a move expected to cost billions of dollars.

Army currently has 41 Taipans in service, which are operated out of Townsville and Oakey in Queensland, and flown by 6th Aviation Regiment in Sydney.

MRH-90 helicopters have been in Army service since 2007 and despite some performance advantages over the Black Hawk, have been plagued with poor availability and fleet-wide groundings.

The Defence Department had estimated the total cost of the MRH-90 program would top $15 billion by the time the helicopters were due to be withdrawn from service in 2037, but it has remained on the "projects of concern" list.

The ADF grounded all Taipan helicopters earlier this year due to safety and maintenance concerns.(ADF: Cameron Martin)Earlier this year the department revealed it was spending more than $37 million to hire civilian helicopters in Townsville to maintain capability while it dealt with long-running problems with the MRH-90 Taipans.

Last year Defence also admitted the door on its multi-role Taipans was too narrow to allow its gun to fire while troops are descending from the aircraft.

During a visit to Sydney's Victoria Barracks, Mr Dutton will confirm the government has decided to scrap all 47 of Army and Navy's Taipans, despite Defence Chief Angus Campbell last year praising them as "an extraordinarily advanced helicopter".

Defence sources say Airbus was recently informed of Australia's decision, and the government is now approaching the United States government to buy up to 40 Black Hawks for the Army and 12 Seahawks for the Navy.

In October the US revealed it had approved the $1.3 billion export to Australia of 12 Sikorsky Romeo Seahawk helicopters, which will eventually replace the Navy's six MRH-90s.

Scrapping the Airbus helicopters comes just three months after the Morrison government sensationally cancelled the $90 billion French Attack-class submarine program in favour of acquiring nuclear boats under the AUKUS agreement with the UK and US.

Defence industry figures say the decision to scrap the Taipans, which were assembled in Australia using a European design, signals the government is determined to prioritise defence capability over all other considerations, including local manufacturing.

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