The United States Army Selects the Bell V-280 Valor as a Replacement for the UH-60 Black Hawk

 

The Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter is iconic for being involved in incidents in Somalia and the mission to hunt down Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan. It is quite old because it has been used by the United States Army since 1979. Therefore the Future Long Range Assault Aircraft program was announced by the U.S. Army to replace it two years ago.

Today the U.S. Army announced it has selected the Bell Textron V-280 Valor aircraft as a replacement for the UH-60 Black Hawk. The Valor defeated the Sikorsky Bell SB-1 DEFIANT X that produced the prototype for the program. The uniqueness of the Valor is that it is an inclined plane like the V-22 Osprey.

With this configuration the Valor can fly vertically like a helicopter but transforms into airplane mode with the propeller turned forward. This allows it to fly faster to the destination to carry out the mission.