Airbus Helicopters announced Monday that it will introduce the U145, an uncrewed version of its H145 helicopter, at the ILA Berlin airshow. The company said it will show a full-scale mock-up of the aircraft at the event and plans to conduct a first flight using a safety pilot onboard by the end of 2026. Airbus is targeting entry into service early in the next decade.
“With the U145, we are offering our customers an autonomous, uncrewed version of our H145 helicopter – combining the proven airframe, power and useful load of the H145 with the autonomy of a UAS,” Matthieu Louvot, CEO of Airbus Helicopters, said. “To develop the U145 and its capabilities as a multi-mission UAS, we will be teaming up with leading autonomous mission partners to further expand the UAS ecosystem in Europe.”
The U145 will not have a physical cockpit and is expected to include changes for cargo operations, including a nose door, foldable loading table and dedicated cargo floor. Airbus said the aircraft is being developed at a maximum takeoff weight of 3,800 kilograms, or about 8,380 pounds, for civil and military missions including cargo supply, disaster response, firefighting, surveillance, drone mothership operations and crewed-uncrewed teaming. The H145 fleet has logged more than 8.5 million flight hours across more than 1,800 aircraft, according to Airbus.
In October, Sikorsky announced a similar concept in the S-70UAS U-Hawk, an autonomous version of the UH-60L Black Hawk that replaces the crew stations and cockpit area for cargo access and autonomous operations.
I believe that eVTOLs will replace helicopters for most of these tasks. Not because they are “cleaner, greener, and quieter”, which they are, but because they will be much cheaper to operate and economics will win.