UH60 denied?

UH60A

Canada is one big country, with one big wildfire problem and one regulator which does not want the worlds most successful heavy category helicopter on it's Restricted Category - the Sikorsky UH60 'Blackhawk'.

UH60’s operate on Restricted Categories in the USA, Australia, Europe and even New Zealand but since the mid-60’s Canada has had an aversion to ex-Military aircraft for which there's no obvious justification. Perhaps influential OEM’s on both sides of the border would rather sell new at 10X the price of military surplus?

It’s an absurd situation because Restricted Category Helicopters are flying in Canada - they just do it on the FAA ‘N’ register via the NAFTA agreement and consequently FAA operators fly north of the border and take the revenue south of the border.

I flew a 1976 Bell 212 with +25,000 hours TT during the 2023 Wildfire Season and it was obvious that the scale of the Fires is outpacing the aging medium/heavy fleet. My Bell 212 was one of 116 registered with Transport Canada and it had seen more fires than I’ve had G&T’s. With the exception of the AS332’s representing 8% of the registered medium/heavy fleet and Sikorsky S61’s and KMAX’s adding another 10% of diversity, the bulk of the fighting force are stoic, reliable Bell's which on average have been flying for half a century!

In total there are 190 Bell medium or heavy helicopters across Canada. In the last five years Bell 204’s numbers dropped 22% (essentially obsolete in Western Canada – superseded by the AS350B3) and only seven Bell 214’s are airworthy (down 23%). Bell 412’s numbers are 19% less with only 18 on the register, but the greatest change was Bell 205’s down by a shocking 38%.

There was improvement with Bell 212’s increasing 9% to 116 airframes but across the sector the number of total airframes decreased by 10%.

The proverbial eggs are all in one basket because 61% of the entire medium and heavy helicopter fleet are legacy Bell 212’s. Just imagine if an emergency AD was released in the middle of July?

As much as I love flying the 212 and 214ST, I can’t see a future without the Sikorsky UH60. Realistically, if the industry wants to scale up to meet the increased burden of larger and longer fire seasons, then Sikorsky is the only manufacturer which has produced a suitable platform in any significant volume over the last 30 years.