{"id":49627,"date":"2022-12-06T01:04:34","date_gmt":"2022-12-06T00:04:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/?p=49627"},"modified":"2025-12-06T02:10:18","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T01:10:18","slug":"the-us-army-already-has-a-replacement-for-the-sh-60-black-hawk-the-bell-v-280-valor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/12\/06\/the-us-army-already-has-a-replacement-for-the-sh-60-black-hawk-the-bell-v-280-valor\/","title":{"rendered":"The US Army already has a replacement for the UH-60 Black Hawk: the Bell V-280 Valor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Future Long-Range Assault (FLRAA) program to replace the famous UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter in the US Army already has a winner.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/04\/20\/the-us-army-announces-replacements-for-the-m-4-carbine-and-the-m-249-machine-gun\/\">The US Army announces replacements for the M-4 carbine and the M-249 machine gun<\/a><\/rel><br \/>\n<rel><a href=\"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/2022\/05\/08\/ghosts-in-the-machine-a-strange-enlistment-video-for-very-atypical-soldiers\/\">Ghosts in the Machine: a strange enlistment video for very atypical soldiers<\/a><\/rel><\/p>\n<p>One of the candidates was the Sikorsky-Boeing SB-1 Defiant, a gyrodine with two coaxial rotors, but in the end <strong>the US Army has opted for the Bell V-280 Valor<\/strong>, as reported by Marcus Weisberger in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.defenseone.com\/business\/2022\/12\/army-chooses-bell-v-280-replace-its-black-hawk-helicopters\/380487\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Defense One<\/a>. It is an aircraft similar to the V-22 Osprey, but smaller. Here you can see <strong>a video of Bell showing the capabilities of the V-280:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Bell V-280 Valor Multi Domain Operations\" width=\"665\" height=\"374\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/T5a9Djp9gsg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>The Black Hawk made its first flight in 1974 and entered service in 1979<\/strong> and has become the helicopter that has served the US Army the longest, demonstrating great versatility. Some 4,000 units have been built so far. <strong>The US Army acquired 2,135 units<\/strong>, being the largest operator, by far, of this model.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52545913175_60d7aae459_c.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>The Bell V-280 Valor made its maiden flight on December 18, 2017<\/strong> in Amarillo, Texas. It has a crew of 4 (pilot, co-pilot and two gunners, like the UH-60) and can carry 14 equipped soldiers (three more than its predecessor). The <strong>V-280 is 15.4 meters long<\/strong> (compared to 19.76 meters for the UH-60, including rotors) <strong>and 24.93 meters wide<\/strong> (the The UH-60's rotor had a diameter of 16.36 meters), which is going to make a considerable difference when operating it in urban areas and other confined spaces. <strong>The curb weight of the V-280 is 8,200 kg <\/strong>, compared to 5,675 kg for the Black Hawk.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52545977073_e7ee6ef663_c.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p>In terms of performance, the V-280 beats its predecessor by a difference: <strong>it reaches a speed of 520 km\/h<\/strong> (compared to 294 km\/h for the UH-60) and has <strong>a range of up to 1,480 km<\/strong> (compared to 590 km for the UH-60). These two features were among the priorities of the US Army for its new utility aircraft.<strong> The V-280 will revolutionize military operations with its speed and range.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52545977093_f1e0f80ca9_c.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>One of the most striking differences between the V-280 Valor and the V-22 Osprey is the way their engines tilt.<\/strong> While the entire engine nacelle rotates in the V-22, in the V-280 only turns one part. <em>\"Fixed engine nacelle design reduces production costs and improves performance, maintainability and sustainability\"<\/em>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bellflight.com\/products\/bell-v-280\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bell says<\/a>, emphasizing that this system is <em>\"designed to reduce troop workload.\"<\/em><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52544967177_568a5bd2b0_c.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>What remains to be seen is how versatile the V-280 will be<\/strong>, and how easily it can be deployed without requiring large aircraft such as the C-5M Super Galaxy, due to its design and the structure formed by its wings and its engines. In this regard, the UH-60 is hard to beat.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/65535\/52545976973_f2cd752f17_c.jpg\" style=\"width:100%; height:auto; margin:10px 0 10px 0;\" \/><\/p>\n<p>---<\/p>\n<p><small>Photos: <a href=\"https:\/\/es.bellflight.com\/products\/bell-v-280\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">bellflight.com<\/a>.<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Future Long-Range Assault (FLRAA) program to replace the famous UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter in the US Army already has a winner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[11544],"tags":[18011,14750,6182,10431,318],"class_list":["post-49627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-army","tag-bell-v-280-valor","tag-future-long-range-assault-flraa","tag-sikorsky-uh-60-black-hawk","tag-united-states","tag-us-army"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-12 10:03:44","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49627\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.outono.net\/elentir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}