Reduces Bell ARH Order By 30 Percent

Delays and increasing costs has caused the Pentagon to cut the number of Textron Inc. Army helicopters it had planned to purchase through 2013.

The Army will only buy 250 Bell armed reconnaissance helicopters (ARH) during the next five years, instead of 348 originally planned, according to Bloomberg.

The helicopters, originally priced to cost about $10.3 million apiece in inflation-adjusted dollars, including research and development, will now cost about $12.3 million each, a 20 percent increase.

A memo from Pentagon Comptroller Tina Jonas said, "significant schedule slippage has occurred due to development and testing delays." Jonas agreed to the Army-proposed cuts.

Over the next two years helicopters will be tested, from 2008 to 2010, to complete "unanticipated component testing" in what's now a $6.3 billion program, her memo said.

The biggest slashes are in fiscal years 2009 and 2010. The Army will reduce its 2009 order down from 64, taking delivery of 28 ARHs instead; and another 42 in 2010, down from 80.

In something of a mixed message, the cuts come one month after the Pentagon increased the program's budget by $1 billion to compensate for higher labor and material costs, and upgrades to the main rotor system.

The ARH program aims to adapt Bell's commercial 407 helicopter to a military role, to replace the current OH-58D Kiowa Warrior observation helicopter. The new chopper will sport Hellfire missiles, and a gun capable of firing 2,000 rounds per minute.

A handful of the helicopters are now in testing. The idea was to have them ready in 2008 to replace aircraft lost in Iraq... but a series of program snags, including a hard landing by one of the prototypes in February, bumped that schedule back.

Bell Helicopter outbid Boeing in 2005 to develop and build the first phase of what was to be a 512-chopper program. Other aircraft will be purchased after 2013.

The program earned a reprieve from getting axed in Congress this year, which approved only $175 million to buy 12 helicopters in fiscal 2008. The Pentagon had requested $468 million to buy 37 helicopters.

"The Army and Bell coordinated on the restructure of the ARH Program, and the numbers you quoted are consistent with the restructure plans," said Mike Cox spokesman for Fort Worth, TX-based Bell Helicopter.

"The extension of the development contract and the provision of production funding indicate the level of confidence the Army," the Pentagon and Congress have in the ARH Program, Cox said.

Army spokesman Major Thomas McCuin wouldn’t speculate on the program until the budget is formally released in February.

FMI: www.bellhelicopter.com/en/aircraft/military/