Thirty-two years ago I started my helicopter training at Redhill Aerodrome, Surrey, England, sponsored by the global oil industry giant Bristow Helicopters. I completed my commercial pilot's license course on the even-then venerable 1960s-vintage Westland-Bell 47 G4A. The “avionics suite” included an RMI with an ADF, a VOR OBS indicator, and a VHF radio. After 120 hours on the -47, the next step to IFR pilot came on the 9.6-tonne, 19-passenger AS332L Super Puma, a transition I remember well.
Unsurprisingly, in the past 30 years, things in the rotary training world have moved on considerably, and in front of me now, standing in the late summer sunshine on the north ramp outside Leonardo’s Northeast Philadelphia Airport facility, is the Leonardo TH-119, a 21st century solution to training helicopter pilots from ab-initio to instrument pilot and beyond. Leonardo hopes to be successful in pitching this helicopter in the U.S. Navy’s TH-73 competition (previously known as TH-XX) to replace the Bell 206-derived TH-57B/C Sea Rangers based at NAS Whiting Field in Florida. If so, the TH-119 will be training future USN helicopter pilots for perhaps the next 30 years.
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