Different on the outside but with commonalities on the inside, the Army’s Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) will share a MOSA backbone with the Future Long Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA).
The Army wants its Black Hawk replacement fielded quickly, though the schedule faces uncertainty as the Government Accountability Office reviews Bell’s award.
By Dan Parsons | April 1, 2021
Estimated reading time 7 minutes, 33 seconds.
Two teams vying to build the U.S. Army’s Future Long Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) are advancing to the second competitive demonstration phase of an ongoing effort to develop a suitable replacement for the UH-60 Black Hawk by 2030.
Both Bell and a Sikorsky-Boeing team will enter Phase II of competitive demonstration and risk reduction (CD&RR) for FLRAA through two “other transaction authority” project agreements, awarded by the Army’s Aviation and Missile Technology Consortium on March 30.
The U.S. Army plans to choose either the Bell V-280 Valor (top) or a refined version of the SB>1 Defiant, called Defiant X, for FLRAA in 2022. Bell/Sikorsky-Boeing Photos