The Royal Netherlands Navy (RNLN) has taken delivery of a Mission Planning & Analysis System (MPAS) for its fleet of NH90 NFH medium twin naval helicopters. The delivery of the MPAS to the RNLN was completed after a thorough verification of the system by the RNLN, initially at the AgustaWestland Helicopter Support Systems facility in Sesto Calende and then at the De Kooy Naval Base in the Netherlands, after successful completion of the installation and Site Acceptance Tests. The system will be fully operational by the end of 2012.

The RNLN MPAS is based on the state of the art AgustaWestland designed Skyflight Planning System, a multi-helicopter flight and mission planning solution that all variants of AgustaWestland’s mission planning stations rely upon. In particular, Skyflight technology is currently being used for the development of the UK Ministry of Defence’s AW159 and Apache Mission Planning Systems. It is also the core element for the Flight Planning System of the AW101 VVIP helicopter and will be delivered to the Royal New Zealand Air Force in support of mission planning for their AW109 LUH helicopters. The delivered system will now support the RNLN’s operations as well as training activities by providing the users with enhanced situation awareness, flight & mission planning functionality and a complete aircraft data upload/download capability.
 
The Royal Netherlands Navy has ordered a total of 20 NH90 NFHs and was the first customer to receive the NFH variant aircraft in April 2010. The NH90 is the most successful European helicopter programme ever. A total of 529 firm orders have been placed by 19 armed forces in 14 countries including The Netherlands, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal , Sweden, Finland, Norway, Greece, Spain and Belgium in Europe, as well as Australia, New Zealand and Oman. The NH90 programme is managed by NAHEMA (NATO Helicopter Management Agency) representing France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands and Portugal, and by the NH Industries industrial consortium comprising AgustaWestland (32%), Eurocopter (62.5%) and Fokker Aerostructures (5.5%). In the framework of the NH90 programme, AgustaWestland is responsible for the production of the main transmission, tail drive shafts, hydraulic system, automatic flight control system, rear ramp, rear fuselage, the T700/6E1 engine solution installation and on-board computers. Furthermore, AgustaWestland is also responsible for the overall integration of the NH90 naval mission system for all NFH variants.

Source: AgustaWestland
Photo: Rob Vogelaar