Country of origin:

Italy

Description:

Twin-engine utility helicopter

Power Plant:

Two 1,492 kw (2,000 shp) General Electric CT7-2E1 turboshafts

Specifications:

History:

The AW-189 is a development of the earlier AW-139 and AW-169 series and is a twin-engine helicopter designed by Agusta Westland. This is a Finmeccanica company and the helicopters are built in Italy by Leonardo, which was formerly known as Agusta Westland before merging with Leonardo Finmeccanica in 2016. The Model AW-189 was unveiled at the Paris Air Show in June 2011 and the first machine made its first flight at the Company’s facility at Cascina Costa in Italy on 21 December 2011.

A formal application was made for certification with EASA in June 2012, this being received in February 2014. After entering production, the first production machine was flown in October 2013, deliveries beginning to Bristow Helicopters in early 2014, which company operates the type for offshore transport missions in the north sea.

The AW-189 was designed as a utility helicopter for a range of duties, particularly offshore transport, passenger transport, search-and-rescue. A total of six was built for the development program, four prototypes and two pre-production aircraft, these being used to develop mission kits and configurations for various roles. In August 2013 the fifth prototype was sent to the United Kingdom for certification for search-and-rescue missions. A second production line was set up at Yeovil in Somerset in the United Kingdom. In 2015 full-icing protection trials were conducted in Alaska, USA.

The AW-189 is a medium twin-engine helicopter with a five-blade articulated main rotor, a four-blade tail rotor and a retractable tricycle undercarriage powered by two General Electric CT7-2E1 turboshafts. The gearbox is designed to provide for a 50 minute run-dry capacity. Avionics are fully integrated and include four colour LCD panels, a four-axis dual-duplex digital automatic flight control system, autopilot, search and weather radar, etc. It can accommodate up to 19 passengers with a crew of two. The interior is customised to meet the mission requirement of the customer. By July 2013 orders for 80 machines had been received; and by March 2015 this had increased to 150.

In January 2015 a deal was concluded with Russian oil company Rosneft to supply 160 examples, these machines to be produced by HeliVert, a joint venture between Finmeccanica Agusta Westland and Russian Helicopters, HeliVert to be responsible for the Russian and Commonwealth of Independent States countries at its Tomilino facility near Moscow. Bristow Helicopters obtained a ten year contract for search-and-rescue operations in the United Kingdom for the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force and obtained 11 examples for the contract.

In 2014 Westair Aviation in the Asia Pacific region received its first machine, operating in Malaysia, two being supplied for the Malaysian Fire and Rescue Department. The first example of the AW-189 was a demonstrator which was shipped to Australia and was assembled at Essendon, VIC in early 2017 as 9M-AWX (c/n 49029) which was flown to Adelaide, SA and Perth, WA for demonstrations before flying back to Melbourne, VIC. Prior to arrival in Australia it spent some time in Malaysia and Vietnam.

A further example was imported in mid-2017, this machine becoming VH-WEQ (c/n 49022), owned by Vertical Aviation of Dublin, Ireland. It was operated in Australia by Lloyd Helicopters of West Perth, being placed on the register on 15 August 2017, being followed by VH-WEX (c/n 89009) on 5 January 2018.  In November 2019 VH-WEQ was exported to the United Arab Emirates.