H140 Powering through Flight Testing

A year after revealing the H140, Airbus remains confident that the program is on track to meet its projected 2028 entry into service. A fourth aircraft is also on schedule to augment the flight-test fleet later this year. Meanwhile, the company has already amassed firm orders for 61 H140s, propelling the platform to become the best-selling light twin in the EASA CS- 27/FAA FAR Part 27 segment over the past year.

“The unveiling of the H140 is underlined by the sales success we had last year,” said Airbus v-p of light twin helicopter programs Dirk Petry. Counting both orders and options, the company has commitments for more than 100 of the as-yet-uncertified helicopters, outperforming the company’s bookings for 45 H135s last year. However, Petry maintains that the H135 will continue to be a valuable asset to “many public services and military training contracts,” and the H140 is “not a replacement” for its smaller sibling.

With Airbus having commenced industrial production for its first serially-produced airframe, a dedicated combined line for the H135 and H140 will leverage commonalities. This, explained Petry, is “the most efficient setup in terms of production, lead times, and balancing between models.” Production capacity is predicted to “follow demand,” incorporating flexibility for a production rate promised to be “much more than [Airbus is currently] producing” for just the H135.

The H140 is set to enter service in the aeromedical services role in 2028, followed by passenger-transport-configured variants in 2029, and then offshore and utility missions in 2031. Before that can happen, however, 2026 will represent what Petry termed “a year of testing” for the type in the run-up to certification.

Testing Times for a Fleet of Five 

Last year’s active flight-test campaign saw the first H140 prototype (PT1) conduct a “hot and high” campaign in Spain and the French Pyrenees, respectively, with the aircraft having accumulated around 120 flight hours since June 2023. However, despite its work “underlining the maturity of the early prototype,” the nonconforming PT1 was retired from flight testing early last month.

PT2—an airframe that Petry explained represents “the major standard pre-zero for development and configuration”—was introduced in August. This ship conducted cold-weather testing in Finland in December before commencing a snow campaign in Norway.

Although local temperatures reached around -30 degrees C versus the targeted -40 degrees C, Petry confirmed that this is sufficient for service entry in EASA member states. “We did our flight-test program as planned; now we need to rely on heavier snow conditions in Norway primarily to validate the air intake under [these] conditions,” he said.

PT2 is expected to return to Airbus’ Donauwörth, Germany site at the end of this month before embarking on a U.S. certification campaign in the third and fourth quarters. A third aircraft, PT3, has also recently entered operations, helping to calibrate autopilot capabilities, while PT4—the first aircraft to be built in a full serial configuration—will enter service in first quarter 2027. PT4 will be used for major certification testing under relevant operational conditions.

A fifth H140, which has just moved to major component assembly, will be initially operated by Airbus to support the ongoing development of optional equipment post-certification. This will also be used as a demonstration aircraft.

Augmenting the airborne elements, a fuel drop test has successfully validated the airframe’s design, while PT1 will be used for “another test in the context of certification after layup,” Petry said.