Leonardo Flies Fourth Flight-test AW609 | Aviation International News

Leonardo Flies Fourth Flight-test AW609

The company is working with the FAA on certification, but it has not yet released a timeline for that.

Leonardo added a fourth AW609 prototype to the flight-test program on December 23 from the Northeast Philadelphia airport. (Photo: Leonardo)

By Richard Ward

December 27, 2019

Leonardo is confident that the first flight of the production-representative fourth prototype AW609 (AC4) from Northeast Philadelphia Airport on December 23 represents the beginning of the home stretch for certification of the civilian tiltrotor. During that initial flight, some eight years after Leonardo assumed full ownership of the AW609 program, AC4 performed a 20-foot hover to enable data collection and photos, said test pilot Dan Wells. “We moved the controls in each axis and the response [was all good]. Then we did a pedal turn to the left, a pedal turn to the right, and then landed. All went very well.”

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