Right here’s our first take a look at the AW119T destined to the TLFC (Turkish Land Forces Command).
The picture on this article was taken by our contributor Oscar Bernardi not too long ago. It exhibits a Leonardo AW119T Koala, throughout a check flight from the corporate’s plant in Vergiate. The helicopter, s/n 15522 with Italian experimental registration CSX82083 is the primary AW119T sporting the colours of the TLFC (Turkish Land Forces Command). In the intervening time, two AW119T have been produced for Turkey: together with the s/n 15522, the 15521 (in primer paint) is getting used for coaching of the long run IPs (Teacher Pilots).
The TLFC has chosen the Leonardo AW119T helicopter for its subsequent era coaching wants. The contract for the acquisition of 15 of those helicopters was signed final summer time, as Protection Information was first to report. Nonetheless, regardless of the media stories emerged thus far, the T suffix doesn’t determine the Turkish however simply the Coaching variant of the helicopter: AW119T (the place T stands for Coaching) is the designation Leonardo will use out there of the coaching helicopters.
In different phrases, at the moment, there are three variations of the single-engine AW119 helicopter: AW119Kx designed for civil use, AW119M for army use and AW119T for coaching. Each varieties are geared up with state-of-the-art digital avionics suite that allows each VFR and IFR operations, displaying important flight data on two massive multi-function shows, enhancing situational consciousness and lowering pilot workload, such because the Artificial Imaginative and prescient System (SVS), Freeway In The Sky (HITS) depiction, shifting map and embedded Helicopter Terrain Avoidance Warning System (HTAWS).
The AW119M can be utilized for a variety of army missions, together with troop transport, coaching, exterior raise, casualty evacuation, Search and Rescue (SAR), Command and Management (C2), and armed escort. The AW119M can be extremely succesful within the maritime setting.
The AW119 is in excessive demand within the army coaching helicopter market: a U.S. Navy-specific variant of the industrial AW119 “Koala”, designated TH-73 Thrasher and first delivered in August 2021 to switch the 40-year-old TH-57 Sea Ranger, has began coaching the primary class of twelve pupil naval aviators last year.
David Cenciotti is a journalist based mostly in Rome, Italy. He’s the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of many world’s most well-known and skim army aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for main worldwide magazines, together with Air Forces Month-to-month, Fight Plane, and plenty of others, overlaying aviation, protection, battle, business, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown a number of fight planes with completely different air forces. He’s a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Power, a non-public pilot and a graduate in Laptop Engineering. He has written 5 books and contributed to many extra ones.
