By Ken Pole | June 27, 2013 Estimated reading time 6 minutes, 39 seconds.
The first of 15 Boeing CH-147F tandem-rotor helicopters arrived at Canadian Forces Base Petawawa, Ont., on the afternoon of June 27, escorted by a pair of Bell CH-146 Griffons a couple of hours after a formal handover to the Royal Canadian Air Force in Ottawa.
Fuselage 147303 rolled off the Boeing production line at Ridley Park, Pa., a year ago and spent the intervening time undergoing rigorous flight testing and evaluation in Mesa, Ariz. A second aircraft is still being put through its paces at the U.S. Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md. The total estimated life cycle cost for the program is $6.7 billion Cdn. (including $2.3 billion for acquisition, $2.7 billion for an in-service support program, and $1.7 billion for 20 years of personnel and operations costs).
Expected to arrive at the rate of about one a month, the new Chinooks are to be flown by a resurrected 450 Tactical Helicopter Squadron from a new purpose-build facility at Petawawa, home to Canadian Forces special operations. The squadron’s eventual complement of 400 personnel will be under the operational command of 1 Wing at CFB Kingston, which is tasked with providing combat-ready support to the Canadian Army.
At the handover ceremony — attended by, among others, Boeing’s Chris Chadwick, president of Military Aircraft, and Leanne Caret, vice-president of the company’s Vertical Lift Division — Defence Minister Peter MacKay described the aircraft as “not your grandfathers’ Chinook.” That was an oblique reference to the Canadian Forces’ on-and-off experience with C and D models dating to the early 1970s, and to the latest version’s longer-range capabilities, “significantly improved and redesigned” electrical system and other system upgrades.
The new squadron’s first commanding officer is LCol Duart Townsend, who was the last Chinook pilot to be trained as part of the previous 450 Squadron before it was disbanded in 1998. He told Canadian Skies in an exclusive interview shortly before 147303 departed for Petawawa that he had been waiting 22 years for the event.
The last time he flew a Chinook was Aug. 4, 1991, logging only 115 hours before that operation was shut down, but he also has about 2,000 hours on Griffons and legacy Bell CH-135 Twin Hueys. Even though he’s now the squadron CO and more focused on overall management, Townsend admitted with a grin that he has a “cunning plan” to probably get qualified on the F models, but he will likely be limited to under 100 hours.
“I’ll take a qualification where and when I can get it, but it’s more important for my instructor pilots to lay the foundation and get trained first,” he explained. “The men and women of the squadron have been working hard over the last 12 months to assist Boeing and other departments to get the aircraft up and ready and brought on strength.
“It’s a capability that we’ve not had in the Royal Canadian Air Force. Operationally, we had the D models in Afghanistan for two and a half years, but these will give a long-term capability. It’s quite rewarding to see them come back to the air force fleet.”
The F model is the latest iteration of a proven platform dating to the early 1960s. More than 1,200 have been built and sold to 18 countries, the largest orders coming from the U.S. Army and the Royal Air Force.
Its defining counter-rotating rotors (also seen on the venerable Boeing Vertol CH-113 Labrador, which eventually became the backbone of RCAF search-and-rescue operations) eliminate the need for the anti-torque vertical tail rotor found on most other helicopters, allowing all power to be used for lift and thrust. The ability to adjust lift in either rotor makes the Chinook less sensitive to centre-of-gravity shifts, critical for cargo slinging.
The RCAF’s first Chinooks were eight C models, which remained in service until 1991, when they were sold to the Royal Netherlands Air Force. Six Ds were acquired from the U.S. Army in Afghanistan and the four left from that mission are for sale “as is” at the U.S. Air Force “boneyard” in the Arizona desert near Tucson.
