AgustaWestland, a Finmeccanica company, and Kanematsu Corporation are pleased to announce they have been awarded a contract by the Japan National Police Agency (JNPA) to supply a GrandNew law enforcement light twin helicopter which will be operated in Kawagawa prefecture located in the southern Kant? region of Japan.

The order brings to three the number of GrandNew helicopters ordered by the Japan National Police Agency as part of their plan to modernise its fleet. The AgustaWestland GrandNew light twin helicopter features the latest generation avionics, high performance and safety, a large cabin and payload capability that was previously only available with intermediate category helicopters, whilst retaining attractive light twin category economics.

The selection of the GrandNew helicopter brings the number of AgustaWestland light twin helicopters operating in the Japanese law enforcement market to nearly 30 and continues AgustaWestland’s growing share of the Japanese light twin engine market. AgustaWestland expects this growth to continue over the coming years.

Andrew Symonds, President, AgustaWestland Japan said “We are delighted that the JNPA has again selected the GrandNew to meet its future light twin helicopter requirement. The performance, safety features and advanced avionics make the GrandNew the most capable helicopter in its class and ideal for a wide range of law enforcement tasks.”

The GrandNew represents a step change in capability for the JNPA with its state-of-the-art digital avionics for single/dual pilot Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) operation and a four-axis dual duplex digital autopilot coupled with a Flight Director. In addition the helicopter is equipped with the Chelton Flight Systems’ Flight-Logic Electronic Flight Instrument System (EFIS), Synthetic Vision and Highway In the Sky (HITS) embedded functions to deliver ultimate situational awareness and groundbreaking automated flight management capabilities. The new glass-cockpit with a redesigned layout provides excellent visibility and an ergonomic working space for the pilots. A new Radio Management System (RMS) permits the integrated management of radio communication and navigation systems of the helicopter while the Integrated Display System (IDS) provides aircraft/engine data monitoring, crew alert and maintenance data pages.

Orders for almost 320 helicopters from the Grand series have been placed by nearly 200 customers in almost 40 countries worldwide, to perform many tasks including VIP/corporate and passenger transport, EMS, SAR, electronic newsgathering, law enforcement, harbour pilot shuttle, maritime patrol and water pollution monitoring.