Rotorcraft
Bell’s new 427i promises much more than just IFR
By launching the IFR version of its 427 model at Heli-Expo, in Las Vegas in March, Bell Helicopter finally acknowledged its mistakes in introducing the typ

By launching the IFR version of its 427 model at Heli-Expo, in Las Vegas in March, Bell Helicopter finally acknowledged its mistakes in introducing the type in the first place, almost 10 years before. With the public-service market at the time growing at a dizzying rate, the company’s conviction that EMS operators would accept a light-twin helicopter with a VFR-only cockpit and a cabin that could carry a litter only diagonally suggested a certain isolation from the realities of the aeromedical market.

Had Bell been the only company pitching a light twin for the para-public business at the time, however, it might have gotten away with it. Unfortunately, it was competing in an already crowded marketplace.

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