While taking part in the delivery of NHV’s first H160 in April, Gideon Ewers had a chance to reflect on the medium twin’s progression since its service entry in 2021.
I’ll be honest, I’ve always had something of a soft spot for the lines of the H160, which to me reek of glitz and glamour – basically, a hot ship that looks like it’s doing 150 kt while sitting on the helipad. It’s an aircraft that looks as though it would be most at home transporting movers and shakers from one shiny upmarket spot to another – and in fairness this has been a role that operators have looked to the 160 to fulfil, with both standard corporate and ACH variants garnering a good deal of interest and sales.
But there is rather more to the type than its racy good looks. It is no popinjay, and indeed the call to miliary service came long before civil certification, when it was announced by the French government that the type would be the basis to fulfil a joint services helicopter fleet modernisation programme in the form of the H160M Guépard programme.
Was this wise, many pundits wondered. Eyebrows were again raised when it was revealed that France’s maritime SAR capability delivered by the French Navy would be provided by SAR variant H160s leased from Babcock.
The answer to the SAR capability question has been answered, with the service reporting a better than predicted performance at greater than 90% dispatch reliability. The H160M is of course still in development, but those indicators bode well.
Making an entrance
Even with those credentials the rough and rugged world of offshore support work did not spring immediately to mind when considering the H160.
I was aware that the type had entered service with PHI and had started offshore energy support (OES) work from its Houma, Louisiana, base following an exhaustive service entry programme. I had also seen the company’s first H160 being “Bubba-proofed” in Houma shortly after delivery.
I also knew that Bristow had the type in OES service in Nigeria, and of course that Omni was active in Brazil on offshore contracts.
Despite all of that, somehow it was still a surprise when I encountered NHV’s Chief Operating Officer, Jamie John, when we were both on the way to this year’s VERTICON and he told me that NHV would be taking delivery of two H160s this spring as an initial tranche.
The surprise wasn’t that they were acquiring H160s, but that they were going to be tasked to the company’s Den Helder base rather than, say, West Africa. The North Sea is, after all, the premier league when it comes to offshore energy support in both in terms of rugged weather and business competitiveness.
A few days later, during VERTICON, a chance encounter with NHV’s CEO Lars-Henrik Thorngreen resulted in an invitation to accompany him on the delivery of the first H160 from the Airbus factory in Marignane to Den Helder – and so fast forward to early April and grey day in Marignane.
While the NHV base at Ostend might have conceivably been in VFR range, just, and with favourable winds, the prospects looked unrealistic.
Instead, the broad plan was to fly first to Dijon for fuel then on to Ostend for a second fuel stop, and a chance for NHV’s headquarters team to meet their latest addition and finally on to Den Helder.
Working with the NHV crew, Marcus Lipp and Rogier Morssink, we determined over breakfast that some challenges awaited in the form of the weather, especially in the Lower Rhône Valley where the higher terrain, together with the airspace, made filing IFR look like a good idea.
IFR would rule out absolutely the idea of a two-leg trip. The threat of icing gave us further pause, to the extent that we were also considering alternate routes as far west as the Spanish border, before turning north to outflank the weather.
Pictured during a handy fuel stop at NHV’s base in Ostend, Belgium. Image: Gideon Ewers
Conversations at the delivery centre with the Airbus team revealed that in either event, VFR or IFR, our plan would be Marignane-Dijon-Ostend-Den Helder, with a night stop in Ostend.
Little did we know at that point that paperwork in the form of the Danish CAA accepting the serial number of the emergency locator transmitter (ELT) fitted to the life raft would scupper any chance of departure that day.
Clearing the hurdles
All regulatory paperwork is a tortuous process and our ELT snag paled into to insignificance when it comes to the issues Airbus and indeed the FAA have had to overcome to allow the H160 to enter service in the US.
Airbus’s facility at Marignane in south-eastern France was the starting point for the H160’s ‘recorded delivery’ flight. Image: Gideon Ewers
The H160’s aquiline nose and sleek lines have won it many fans. Image: Gideon Ewers
The three-year delay in the FAA granting a certificate centred on two issues. First, an issue with the Helionix avionics suite, which was resolved reasonably quickly.
But the real showstopper was the design of the redundant lubrication system on the main gear box (MGB), which was not covered by the existing FAA regulations and required the agency to go through a rule-making process to amend the relevant regulation.
For an under-funded and under-staffed agency, this would be a long-winded process at the best of times, but this was 2020 and so nothing was moving what with lockdowns and shutdowns.
Measured in terms of the end of the pandemic, it could be argued that the snag only cost Airbus a delay of one year, which is not a bad turn of speed for regulators. Though of course it did have the knock-on effect of delaying FAA certification of the super-medium H175, since the FAA limits active type certifications to one type per manufacturer at a time.
Ready for the off
Back in Marignane, we kept looking for a resolution on the ELT question, or at least a waiver, since ours was neither a commercial flight nor significantly over water, but none was forthcoming before our 15:30 departure deadline (fuel is only available at Dijon until 17:00).
Thus, the only Belgian beer we would be sampling that evening would be imported.
We determined to regroup the following morning for an early start to make the trip in a single day, since Lipp was required to carry out simulator sessions as one of NHVs instructor pilots, Morssink was due for HUET recurrent training, and I was required back in the UK by mid-week.
Also needing to be borne in mind was that Den Helder has a weekday curfew of 22:00, so an early start was the plan to avoid any stress.
Tuesday morning dawned with skies that could only be described as severe clear, notwithstanding the expectation of a brisk headwind for the earlier part of the trip.
With formalities completed, we started up MSN1088 with the confident air of those on who the gods of the air are smiling.
Pride goes before a fall, and while carrying out the system test on Autopilot 2 a fault was revealed that, despite several re-cycles, we could not get to clear.
While it would have been possible under the minimum equipment list (MEL) to continue with one autopilot, and had the fault revealed itself later we would have pressed on, but there on the apron of the Airbus factory the idea of doing anything but seek a fix before departure seemed foolish.
The sands of time ran on, and the healthy time reserve began to erode. But happily the fault was found – a slightly errant dust cover – and rectified.
Fortified with another excellent lunch and conversation in the staff restaurant, we and more importantly the helicopter were ready to go – and with a margin on the Dijon deadline, good timing!
Head to head
In business, and especially in the aviation business, timing is everything and it can be argued that the timing of service entry of the H160 was very close to as good as it could be.
The medium twin market has been dominated by Leonardo’s AW139 since its service entry in 2001, and until the arrival of the H160 it had the market pretty much all its own way.
At the launch of the H160 at Heli-Expo in 2015, it was hailed by the then Airbus Helicopters CEO Guillaume Faury as “the AW139 killer”. This was perhaps a little bullish and, it has to be said, sales of the AW139 have remained strong.
Indeed, sales of the H160 have experienced headwinds and no little buffeting, much like the ones we experienced flying up the Rhône Valley towards our first fuel stop.
But that is a trend that has progressively shifted, with sales in the last year reaching parity with the AW139.
Benoit Klein, the Head of the H160 programme, says: “We’ve seen it across the sectors. In offshore, PHI have reported good availability and fuel burn in line with predictions. We have 65 aircraft in service flying all over the world and operators are getting 94% on dispatch reliability in energy market operations.”
For Klein, it is important to stress that it’s not just in OES that the type is performing.
NHV’s Marcus Lipp pictured in the cockpit of his new charge. Image: Gideon Ewers
He points to the H160’s role with France’s Gendarmerie Nationale and the New York State Police, which both took delivery of their first aircraft last year, as well as Japan’s National Police Agency, which is operating two of the type.
As well the SAR operations for the French Navy that I mentioned earlier, Klein says: “It’s important because they are flying every day in difficult conditions, poor weather, in a corrosive maritime environment and it’s doing well.”
EMS operations are also getting under way, with the first examples completed by Metro Aviation entering service in the US, serving the Houston area.
As a result, sales of the H160 have continued to build.
Gaining momentum
According to Klein, 2025 was a turning point for the type’s commercial momentum, which has created a high-quality problem for Airbus in terms of meeting demand and keeping backlogs under control.
Until late last year, the H160 final assembly was on a line shared with the H175, but now the super-medium will share a final assembly line (FAL) with the Tiger attack helicopter, while the existing line is dedicated to the H160.
This will mean an annual production rate in the regional of 35 to 40 aircraft is achievable, though further expansion of that line will be needed to attain the eventual goal of 60 a year (40 civil and 20 H160Ms), which is what will be needed to meet the expected demand.
Another programme designed to improve production rates is the generation factory programme at Marignane, which aims to cut lead time for main gear box production by half.
Clearly there are some elements that are outside Airbus’s supply control, but the company is looking to further reduce supply chain demand by progressive expansion of TBO intervals on major components like MGBs.
Klein says: “We were able to get the MGB time between overhauls (TBO) to 3,000 hours [and] examinations of fleet leader MGBs revealed exactly what we expected. That gave us the confidence to extend the TBO, and, as the fleet matures, we are expecting to progressively extend the TBO to 6,000 hours.”
I thought about Klein’s words as we began our approach to NHV’s Ostend headquarters, as the sun began to arc towards the horizon, and thought more about the prospects for medium helicopters in offshore operations in the North Sea, which now filled the horizon.
In recent years, much of the discussion has centred on the heavy versus super-medium debate, while scant attention has been given to the role of mediums in the space. Something of an oversight, I reckon.
It is, however, something that may frame the equipment choice discussion in the coming years – especially if, as Airbus and NHV confidently expect, the H160 delivers in that most demanding of offshore energy environments, the North Sea.
This article “Coming of age” was published in the Volume 20 Issue 3 of RotorHub International. To read more articles like this, apply for your complimentary subscription today.
