Boeing’s Little Bird Helicopter Production Set To End

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Boeing’s Little Bird Helicopter Production Set To End

Boeing expects to shutter its production of the Little Bird light helicopter after fulfilling a current contract with the Thai armed forces. The Little Bird is well known for its continued service with the U.S. Army’s famed 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR), which operates the helicopter in

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configurations. Boeing has been able to secure just two export sales of its ‘international’ AH-6i variant to Saudi Arabia and Thailand in the past 15 years. A separate company, MD Helicopters, also produces Little Bird variants and looks set to continue to do so.

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have

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to close out its Little Bird production line. The company disclosed the news at the DefenceIQ International Military Helicopter conference in London, which opened yesterday.

An AH-6i destined for Thailand seen during flight testing. Boeing

“We are probably going to cease production on the AH-6i,” Mark Ballew, Boeing’s director for Vertical-Lift Program Business Development and Strategy, told Aviation Week. “We will complete production for Thailand, but right now, unless there is another country that came along immediately and said we want AH-6 today, it would still be a challenge as there would be a gap in production.”

Ballew also “suggested that rebuilding the supply chain for the aircraft would not only take time, but also make the aircraft more expensive to produce,” according to Aviation Week‘s report.

TWZ has reached out to Boeing directly for more information.

Boeing is

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to the Royal Thai Army under a contract finalized back in 2022, valued at just under $104 million. The U.S. government

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.

The single turbine engine AH-6i is an evolution of the

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, originally developed by Hughes Helicopters in the 1960s and made famous by its service with the U.S. Army as a light scout helicopter during the Vietnam War, and subsequent H-6 variants based around

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. McDonnell Douglas acquired Hughes Helicopters in 1984. Boeing subsequently absorbed McDonnell Douglas, to include the Little Bird and the rest of the former Hughes Helicopter product line, in 1997.

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A prototype YOH-6A seen during US Army testing in the 1960s. US Army

The Little Bird’s story has become somewhat confusing in that Boeing sold off virtually all of its inherited Hughes Helicopter product line, with the prominent exception of the AH-64 Apache, in 1999 to what has become MD Helicopters. However, Boeing continued to work with the Little Bird design after that, including upgraded Mission Enhanced Little Birds (MELB) for the 160th SOAR.

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One of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment’s MH-6 Little Birds seen during a public demonstration in 2024. Jamie Hunter

The company also developed

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and an improved light attack variant

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. The AH-6S was pitched to the U.S. Army for its abortive Armed Aerial Scout (AAS) program. The export AH-6i is based on the AH-6S.

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As already noted, Boeing has found just two customers for the AH-6i, Thailand and Saudi Arabia, the

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for the Saudi Arabian National Guard (SANG) in 2014. Jordan signed a letter of intent to

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, but

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never materialized.

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By comparison, MD Helicopters has

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in the international military market with Hughes Model 500-derived Little Birds, as well as sales of related commercial variants. This includes dozens of MD-530FU light attack variants

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, some of which

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after the Taliban takeover in August 2021.

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What level of involvement Boeing expects to continue to have in supporting the 160th SOAR’s Little Bird fleet going forward is unclear. The Army had previously expected to

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with a special operations version of the design selected for the service’s

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. However,

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and the 160th is now looking, at least in the near term, at options for further upgrades to its Little Bird fleet, as you can read more about

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.

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For Boeing, plans to shed the Little Bird production line also

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across its military and commercial portfolios. This has translated to major delays on very-high-profile programs, including new Air Force One jets for the U.S. Air Force, and

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. In 2023, the company had also announced its intention to shutter

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and refocus those resources elsewhere, again citing a lack of new customers.

Unless a major new customer for the AH-6i emerges soon, Boeing’s part of the Little Bird story looks set to come to end, though versions of the iconic helicopter will remain in production through MD Helicopters.

Contact the author: *****@*****.tld

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