ILA Berlin Airshow 2022 Roundup

Airbus Helicopters has established an industry team to offer the company’s H145M twin-engine light rotorcraft to meet a German requirement for a Light Utility Helicopter (LUH). The OEM has joined with Ecms Aviation Systems, Hensoldt’s Avionics and Sensors businesses, Liebherr-Aerospace, Rohde & Schwarz, Safran Helicopter Engines and ZF Luftfahrttechnik to form LUH SK Team H145M. LUH SK is short in German for Light Utility Helicopter Streitkrafte (Armed Forces). Credit: Airbus Helicopters/Cara Irina Wagner

Missile manufacturer MBDA has unveiled a ground-launched cruise-missile solution to a growing European demand for ground-based deep fires. The Joint Fire Support Missile (JFS-M) unveiled here at the ILA Berlin Air Show is designed to be a modular weapon with a range of up to 499 km (310 mi.) that builds off the company’s development of uncrewed remote carriers for the European Future Combat Air System (FCAS). Credit: MBDA

The main topics at this year's Berlin Airshow—the first since 2018—were increased defense spending and new technologies, Aviation Week editors Tony Osborne, Thierry Dubois and Jens Flottau discovered. Credit: Besse Berlin GmbH

As Europe’s Clean Sky 2 research and technology project nears its end, Airbus and industry partners are expected to complete the construction of their multifunction fuselage demonstrator, aiming at lower cost and weight as well as fast-paced manufacturing. Clean Sky 2 is running until 2024 and thus overlaps with Clean Aviation, both being run by the Clean Aviation joint undertaking (JU). Two-thirds of Clean Sky 2’s demonstrators have yet to be delivered, says Sebastien Dubois, Clean Aviation JU’s head of programs. Credit: Clean Aviation

MTU Aero Engines says it has identified a Flying Fuel Cell (FFC) and Water Enhanced Turbofan (WET) as “favored” concepts for revolutionary reductions in emissions from aircraft propulsion systems. The statement at the ILA Airshow on June 23 omits a previously stated MTU concept for a composite cycle variant of the Pratt & Whitney Geared Turbofan (GTF) engine, which adds a piston compressor and motor to the baseline turbomachinery. Credit: MTU Aero Engines

The chief technology officers of seven companies involved in the EU’s Clean Aviation public-private partnership have committed to work together on topics that would otherwise be competitive issues, praising the framework the €4.1 billion ($4.3 billion) initiative is giving the industry. We first need to win the race for 2050 [the target for climate neutrality], and then we will worry about the rest,” says Nicole Dreyer-Langlet, Airbus’ VP for research and technology in Germany. Credit: JAUBERT French Collection / Alamy Stock Photo

Boeing hopes to secure a contract early next year for Germany’s future fleet of Chinook transport helicopters as it works to finalize requirements for the rotorcraft. Berlin selected the U.S. Army version of the CH-47 tandem-rotor aircraft for its Heavy Transport Helicopter (STH) requirement on June 1, after a long-running face-off against Sikorsky’s CH-53K King Stallion. Credit: Alamy stock photo

After more than four months of beating back Russia’s unprovoked invasion, Ukraine is now buckling under the weight of Moscow’s concentrated assault in the nation’s east. Backed by rocket and artillery barrages more than 10 times what the beleaguered defenders can muster, Russian troops are expanding their gains in the Donbas, threatening to create a “land bridge” from Russia to the Crimean peninsula. More concerning, Russia’s blockade of Odessa has precipitated a worldwide grain shortage, and Ukraine’s surviving navy is no match for the two dozen ships and five submarines of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. Credit: U.S. Army

M-SHORAD

Germany is pursuing an accelerated timeline for its Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter acquisition as the country looks to bring the aircraft into operation before the end of the decade. Berlin presented a letter of request to Washington to acquire the aircraft just three days after announcing on March 14 it had selected the type as part of the Tornado replacement program, J.R. McDonald, Lockheed’s head of F-35 strategy and development, told a press conference here at the ILA Berlin Air Show on June 22. Credit: Alamy