(Tribune News Service) — The next Marine One presidential helicopter — built in Connecticut by Sikorsky and already in limited use — is edging closer to a formal unveiling.

The Sikorsky VH-92A Patriot is replacing the White House’s existing fleet of 11 VH-3D Sea King and eight VH-60N White Hawk helicopters, which were also built by Sikorsky. The White House expects to field a fleet of 21 VH-92A helicopters — as a security measure, multiple helicopters are flown during presidential transport — along with two more to function as test aircraft, as upgrades are rolled out for the fleet in the years to come.

“They’re already in service for some of the presidential missions,” said Paul Lemmo, president of Sikorsky, during a Connecticut Business & Industry Association forum late last month. “Right now there’s a mix of the new aircraft and the old aircraft, and over the next year or so we expect the VH-92 to take over completely.”

The delivery of the high-profile helicopter comes at a critical moment for Sikorsky, one of Connecticut’s leading aerospace companies. Sikorsky, owned by Lockheed Martin, employs nearly 8,000 workers in the state among its total of 12,400 employees.

Late last year, Sikorsky and parent Lockheed Martin lost their bid to produce a long-term replacement for the Black Hawk, a huge blow for the company and its production base in Connecticut.

Sikorsky remains in the running for an armed Army scout helicopter, in competition with Bell and its Providence, R.I.-based parent Textron. The first “Raider X” prototype largely complete at Sikorsky‘s facility in West Palm Beach, Fla., but both Sikorsky and Bell are waiting on the Army engine that is still under development by GE Aviation.

Delayed debut

Sikorsky began assembling the new Marine One helicopters in 2019 and delivered the first two prototypes in November 2021 in the traditional green-and-white-top color scheme. That year, the Government Accountability Office estimated the VH-92A’s price tag at $218 million for each helicopter, for a total program cost of $5 billion. Sikorsky now expects the final helicopter to be completed next summer.

The helicopter’s debut has been delayed by snags with a “government-developed mission communications system,” in the words of GAO’s most recent update on the VH-92A program. Sikorsky has had to find other workarounds as well to reduce engine exhaust and fluid discharges in landing zones, according to GAO.

A Sikorsky spokesperson referred CT Insider questions on the new White House helicopter to the Navy. In email responses to CT Insider queries, a spokesperson with the U.S. Navy stated the timing for the VH-92A taking over the Marine One mission is “an event-driven goal, not a time-driven one” and that a “phased transition” plan has been in effect since last November.

“All respective offices are working diligently to ensure a smooth, safe, and timely transition occurs from the traditional fleet of helicopters to the VH-92A,” stated Megan Wasel, a Navy press spokesperson.

During a media tour last year at its headquarters manufacturing plant in Stratford, Sikorsky did not allow a CT Insider reporter access to a building where VH-92A Patriot helicopters have been assembled.

But the VH-92A has popped up in the skies in Connecticut and elsewhere, as evidenced in video posted to YouTube in February capturing a VH-92A Patriot in flight over a Milford neighborhood and Long Island Sound. The following month, additional video surfaced of two VH-92A helicopters on a deployment to Las Vegas during a visit there by President Biden.

Video is also online of a Marine Corps “transition” ceremony last summer, in which the VH-92A took its place besides other aircraft flown by Marine Helicopter Squadron One, or HMX-1.

Survivability

The VH-92A Patriot is one of four major Sikorsky programs over the past several years, along with continuing production of Army Black Hawk and Navy Seahawk helicopters; the CH-53K King Stallion cargo helicopter for the Marines; and the HH-60 Jolly Green II commando helicopter for the Air Force.

At the CBIA forum, Lemmo said the work required to build one King Stallion helicopter equates roughly to construction of eight to 10 Black Hawks, with the Marines eyeing as many as 200 CH-53K helicopters in all. The U.S. Department of Defense calculated earmarks for the CH-53K at $5 billion in the 2023 and 2024 fiscal years, equal to the most recent estimate on total spending for the VH-92A Patriot.

Sikorsky remains in the running for an armed Army scout helicopter, in competition with Bell and its Providence, R.I.-based parent Textron. The first “Raider X” prototype largely complete at Sikorsky‘s facility in West Palm Beach, Fla., but both Sikorsky and Bell are waiting on the Army engine that is still under development by GE Aviation.

Sikorsky is scheduled currently to produce its last Black Hawk for the U.S. Army in 2027. Lemmo reiterated last week he expects the possibility of additional orders, however, whether from the U.S. or foreign militaries, and that Sikorsky could get as much as a half-century’s more work retrofitting existing Black Hawks with upgrades. Sikorsky is currently doing just that for the U.S. Coast Guard’s fleet of MH-60 Jayhawk helicopters, which are getting new cabins.

“We’re hopeful that the Army will identify some additional production beyond 2027,” Lemmo said. “There is a significant demand internationally for the Black Hawk helicopter. ... People are seeing what transpired in Ukraine and operationally how helicopters have been used — where they’ve been successful, where they have not, and what is required of a helicopter to be survivable.”

Eisenhower to Biden and beyond

Dwight D. Eisenhower became the first sitting president to travel by helicopter, from the White House to Camp David on July 12, 1957, in a bubble-canopy Bell H13-J during a drill to test evacuation plans in the event of a nuclear missile crisis.

On Sept. 7 that year in the early morning hours in Newport, R.I., Eisenhower cut short a vacation to return to the White House to deal with domestic and international crises, as Black students were blocked from attending classes in Little Rock, Ark., and as the Soviet Union attempted to assert dominance over Syria.

Eisenhower asked to skip the motorcade in favor of a short hop on a Sikorsky H-34 helicopter to Quonset Point Naval Air Station for a return flight to Washington. The White House would end up making the VH-34 Choctaw — also dubbed the Seahorse — the first official White House helicopter.

The Sikorsky VH-3A Sea King was next up in 1963, with the more recent VH-3D version introduced in 1975 and still in the White House fleet today. The VH-60 White Hawk debuted in 1989 from the base Black Hawk design, which can be loaded easily on Air Force cargo planes for overseas transport.

The VH-92A design is derived from Sikorsky‘s S-92 commercial helicopter, which first flew in 1998. The company built more than 300 S-92 helicopters over a quarter century, primarily for use as shuttles to offshore oil rigs and for the coast guards of Ireland, the United Kingdom and South Korea.

Of more than 30 incidents involving S-92 helicopters logged by the Flight Safety Foundation in its Aviation Safety Network database, only one has involved fatalities as a result of a mechanical issue — a March 2009 crash of a Cougar Helicopter flight off Newfoundland with only one survivor of 18 people on board, after a cracked stud led to a loss of oil pressure in the main gear box.

In May 1993, a VH-60N helicopter went down in Maryland during a test flight after maintenance, killing four Marines. A Department of Defense investigation blamed the crash on pins that were installed improperly by Marine Corps personnel who maintained the helicopters, resulting in engines flaming out as the pilot attempted an “autorotation” maneuver during the test flight.

Three years before, a freak accident damaged a VH-3D Sea King during a landing rehearsal for a presidential visit in Chicago, when winds blew plastic fencing material off posts positioned to keep people at a distance. The fencing blew into the pylon that connects the tail rotor to the rear boom which snapped, causing the helicopter to roll onto its side. Four people were treated at the scene for minor injuries.

(c)2023 Journal Inquirer, Manchester, Conn.

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