HH-60 vs. AB-139 SAR

[Barannfin]

Ever since I heard about the US coast guards plans to purchase 40 AB-139's I was curious as to why they were chosen over the sikorskys. When I was actually looking at the specs. for the 2 helicopters I was surprised to find out that the 60 had the 139 beat in almost everything. I know it is naive to only look on paper, but why did they choose the 139?

I am thinking that there must be something they don't like about the 60s, is it cost, maint.? what? It is just a little confusing when they could just add onto their fleet with proven helicopters instead of the seemingly inferior 139s.

Just looking for some answers, or theories from those with more exp./knowledge than me.

[rjsquirrel]

Those reports that circulated two weeks ago were marketing bumf from the PR departments of Bell and Lockheed - literally exact copy from the marketing departments. The USCG awarded the massive Deepwater contract to Lockheed - call that the big contract. This will allow new ships, shore facilities, communications, and eventually some helicopters. The Lockheed team chose Bell a while back - the US Coast Guard has not - and so when the big contract was let, Bell dove in and announced the 139 "selection".

In fact, the 139 was switched into the game about 2 days before the announcement of the big contract, because the 609 was a clear nogo, the USCG has an aversion to vapour helicopters, and it was the previous "selection" according to the fiction writers in Texas.

USCG Procurement officers are quite willing to tell the world that THEY will select the helicopter when the time comes, it is not an automatic right given to the winner of the big contract. All that has been decided is that the HH-60J's will get new avionics, since the USCG loves them. Any new helicopters are perhaps 7 to 10 years off, and likely to be the source of a new competition within the big contract.

Note in all the hype, no Coast Guard people said anything about what type new helicopters, let alone unproven 139's (is BA or AB?) The fat lady has yet to even go on stage.

Watch big doings between the smaller ship-based solutions (new H-60's, AB-139, EC-355, and even NH-90) and the bigger land-based (S-92, EH-101) when battle lines are drawn.

[Barannfin]

Thanks for answering my question, I thought it odd that they were ready to go ahead and purchase a huge amount of as yet, unproven helicopters. I am relieved that they will hopefully be looking at all of their options when the time comes. And hopefully by then the manufacturers will have the bugs, worked out. As to the time frame I was hoping that the procurement would start right as I graduated college so they would be looking for many new pilots, aww shucks :( .

Thanks again for posting.

[TwinHueyMan]

Hey guys,

Came across this in the Janes Farnborough e-mail brief - looks like the CG has made their decision:

http://farnborough.janes.com/docs/farnborough/show_daily/news26Jul2002_015936.shtml

Guess its going to be bye-bye to the Jayhawks?

Mike