HAL will Produce Light Utility Helicopters for IAF and Indian Army

Hindustan Aeronautics Limited will now be going to produce a Light Utility Helicopter domestically. This announcement was made during an ongoing Def-Expo being held in Lucknow.
The Light Utility Helicopter that will be domestically manufactured got the initial operational clearance paving the way for production to start for replacing the aging fleet of Cheetah and Chetak helicopters.

Hindustan Aeronautics Limited will be manufacturing 200 helicopters that are specially designed and developed to meet the operational requirements of the Indian Army and Indian Air Force.

R Madhavan, CMD, HAL received the IOC document from Mr. G Sateesh Reddy, Secretary, Department of Defence R & D and Chairman, Defence Research and Development Organisation at the ‘Bandhan’ program held at ongoing Def-Expo 2020 today in the presence of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath among others.

R Madhavan, CMD of HAL said that “This is a momentous occasion for HAL. It reinforces our commitment towards indigenous R&D programs on self-reliance and enhancing the operational effectiveness of the Indian Armed Forces. HAL is fully geared up to fulfill the requirements of its customers in a time-bound manner.”

Arup Chatterjee, Director, Engineering & R&D, HAL, said: “the performance of basic configuration of LUH in all terrains and under all weather conditions is satisfactory and HAL is moving towards the next phase of integrating and flight testing of Mission & Role Equipment on LUH”.

HAL said in a statement “Till now three prototypes have been built and cumulatively completed over 550 flights under various terrains and climatic conditions like cold weather, hot weather, sea-level and high altitude complying to stringent certification and user requirements.”

HAL Further added that “the helicopter’s endurance and reliability were established during the hot weather and high-altitude trials when LUH was ferried from Bengaluru, covering over 7000 km of distance and continuously flying for 17 days without any abnormalities”.