Coloradans are developing the state's newest firefighting tool: transforming a Black Hawk into a Firehawk

July 26, 2022
“These aim to put out brush fires before they become forest fires,” Senior Project Engineer Hudson Smith said in this piece by Nick Coltrain for The Denver Post.

CENTENNIAL, Colo. - Sitting in a Centennial hangar is a Black Hawk helicopter far from fit to fly. Its electronic guts hang loose in the cockpit. Its floors are ripped up. Its seats might as well be on a beach somewhere. And it’s looking just the way it’s supposed to, Nick Coltrain reports for The Denver Post Continue reading original article.

The Military & Aerospace Electronics take:

26 July 2022 - Nick Coltrain reports for The Denver Post that the work-in-progress helicopter came from Poland by way of Texas before landing at Centennial’s United Rotorcraft. The company has converted several of the helicopters already, but always for out-of-state customers. This is the first that’s staying home.

“Don’t get me wrong, it’s great that we’re doing it for the state of California,” program manager Eric Lama said during a recent tour of the hangar. “But to be able to have this in our own backyard and doing good for our local communities, that’s the icing on the cake for us.”

Related: Army asks Sikorsky to build 120 UH-60M Black Hawk military helicopters and avionics in $2.3 billion contract

Related: Sikorsky to redesign flight-control computer avionics on CH-53K helicopters to stave-off parts obsolescence

Related: Boeing receives $194.6 million order for special forces heavy-lift helicopters with digital common avionics

Jamie Whitney, Associate Editor
Intelligent Aerospace

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