Army planners needed a Black Hawk helicopter simulator to train pilots in their 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment-Airborne, known as SOAR(A), Fort Campbell, Ky. They found a solution with CAE USA, Tampa, Fla.
Engineers at CAE will build an MH-60 Black Hawk Block 1 combat-mission simulator (CMS), under a $26 million contract from the Army’s Program Executive Office-Simulation, Training, and Instrumentation (PEO STRI), Orlando, Fla.
The 160th SOAR(A) operates the MH-60K, a highly modified utility helicopter designed for special operations missions such as infiltration, exfiltration, and resupply, and the MH-60L, an armed version of the Black Hawk helicopter.
The simulator will support training and mission rehearsal for both variants. Featuring CAE’s Medallion-S image generator and a large field-of-view display system, it will enhance mission rehearsal capabilities with CAE’s common environment/common database (CE/CDB) architecture.
“The U.S. Special Operations Forces continue to play a prominent role in U.S. military actions, and they have an ongoing requirement for more advanced mission rehearsal and training systems,” said John Lenyo, president of CAE USA.
CAE will deliver the MH-60 CMS in late 2006, following the delivery of an A/MH-6 Little Bird CMS this summer and the delivery of a MH-47G CMS scheduled for spring 2006. For more information, see www.cae.com.
