In an interview with Defensehere.com, Alberto Robles-Sendin, Vice President and Head of Latin America Region at Airbus Helicopters talked about Airbus Helicopter's presence in Latin American market and the twin engine helicopter H145.
Airbus is a company in designing, manufacturing and delivering aerospace products, services and solutions to customers on a worldwide scale. With around 134,000 employees and as the largest aeronautics and space company in Europe, Airbus is at the forefront of the aviation industry. The company build the commercial aircraft and consistently capture about half of all commercial airliner orders.
"Brazil is the biggest market in Latin America, not only for us or for many others. All in all, we have over 1400 helicopters in operation in the region. Out of those, 1400 are more than 800 are flying here in Brazil. So, it is a very significant market both on the military side. The three armed forces operate our helicopters. So a lot of military police, fire fighting and this type of activities and the corporate, private business, which is also quite important. All over the region, we have presence in practically all the countries in Latin America." he said.
H145: "It is one of the most successful twin engine light medium helicopter"
"The H145, It is one of the most successful twin engine light medium helicopters that we are promoting. It is one of the natural substitutes of the very novel Huey the UH helicopters. We are in different projects on the military side, on the public side, and also on HEMS. It is Helicopter Emergency Evacuation System. This helicopter is today the leader in this segment. So, there are enough points to justify having this helicopter here." said Alberto Robles-Sendin, Vice President and Head of Latin America Region at Airbus Helicopters.
Regarding Airbus Helicopter's presence in various exhibition in latin America, he said "We have had last two days a lot of interest and a lot of delegations coming to visit us from not only from Latin America, from actually from all over the world. Yes, we have two or three important contracts. So, hopefully we'll be able to sign very soon."
According to the information in the Airbus' web portal, the new version of Airbus’ best-selling H145 light twin-engine helicopter adds a new, innovative five-bladed rotor to the multi-mission aircraft, increasing the useful load of the helicopter by 150kg. The simplicity of the new bearingless main rotor design also eases maintenance operations, further improving the benchmark serviceability and reliability of the H145, while improving ride comfort for both passengers and crew.
In total, there are more than 1,600 H145 family helicopters in service, logging a total of more than seven million flight hours. Powered by two Safran Arriel 2E engines, the H145 is equipped with full authority digital engine control (FADEC) and the Helionix digital avionics suite. It includes a high performance 4-axis autopilot, increasing safety and reducing pilot workload. Its particularly low acoustic footprint makes the H145 the quietest helicopter in its class, while its CO2 emissions are the lowest amongst its competitors.
More than 200 H145 helicopters are in service around the world in public service and law enforcement missions.
