{"id":7038162,"date":"2026-08-15T19:07:43","date_gmt":"2026-08-15T19:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/som2nypost.com\/aerospace\/us-army-moves-to-robinson-r66-under-10b-training-deal\/"},"modified":"2026-08-15T19:07:43","modified_gmt":"2026-08-15T19:07:43","slug":"us-army-moves-to-robinson-r66-under-10b-training-deal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/som2nypost.com\/?p=7038162","title":{"rendered":"US Army moves to Robinson R66 under $10B training deal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The US Army has selected the Robinson R66 as its next primary helicopter trainer under a contract with M1 Support Services worth up to $10 billion over 26 years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Army announced that M1 had won its Flight School Next competition, a major overhaul of initial helicopter pilot training at Fort Rucker, Alabama. M1\u2019s winning training system is built around the turbine-powered R66, which will take over the primary training role now performed by the Airbus UH-72 Lakota.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Under the contract, M1 will provide training through a contractor-owned, contractor-operated system rather than relying on Army-owned primary training helicopters.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Flight School Next is expected to train between 800 and 1,500 Army helicopter pilots each year. The Army currently trains about 1,250 new aviators annually at Fort Rucker.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Flight School Next consolidates several aviation training functions under a single contractor and calls for commercially available aircraft, simulators, flight instruction, academic instruction, maintenance and other support.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Army said the approach is intended to produce pilots with stronger basic flying skills while reducing the long-term cost of initial rotary-wing training.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cFlight School Next delivers a critical improvement in our Initial Entry Rotary Wing Training model,\u201d said Maj. Gen. Clair Gill, Commanding General of the US Army Aviation Center of Excellence. \u201cSimply put, it delivers new military helicopter pilots with far better foundational skills.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">M1\u2019s team includes Robinson Helicopter, Quantum Helicopters, General Dynamics Information Technology and the University of North Dakota Aerospace Foundation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The award gives Robinson a major new military training role, putting the five-seat R66 at the center of the Army\u2019s initial helicopter training program. The R66 is powered by a Rolls-Royce RR300 turboshaft engine and is based on Robinson\u2019s familiar two-blade rotor system.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">M1 beat Bell in the final stage of the Flight School Next competition. Bell proposed the Bell 505 as its training platform, while M1\u2019s bid centered on the Robinson model.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Army said Flight School Next will replace multiple existing training contracts with a single integrated system. The Army did not disclose in its award announcement how many R66 helicopters will ultimately be delivered.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The US Army has selected the Robinson R66 as its next primary helicopter trainer under a contract with M1 Support Services worth up to $10 billion over 26 years. The Army announced that M1 had won its Flight School Next competition, a major overhaul of initial helicopter pilot training at Fort Rucker, Alabama. M1\u2019s winning [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7038163,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12024],"tags":[158047,2679,10465,11379,200745,13260,324],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-7038162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aerospace","tag-10b","tag-army","tag-deal","tag-moves","tag-r66","tag-robinson","tag-training"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>US Army moves to Robinson R66 under $10B training deal - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/som2nypost.com\/?p=7038162\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"US Army moves to Robinson R66 under $10B training deal - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The US Army has selected the Robinson R66 as its next primary helicopter trainer under a contract with M1 Support Services worth up to $10 billion over 26 years. The Army announced that M1 had won its Flight School Next competition, a major overhaul of initial helicopter pilot training at Fort Rucker, Alabama. 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