Possible presidential helicopter-plane

I saw this on Wings over Iraq, a mil-blog written by a 10th Mountain Division helo pilot. He’s quirky fun and well, a Cardinals fan so hey, I am happy. Anyway, I can’t believe they really thinking about this given all the bad press the V-22 Osprey had during its development and initial training phase.

On other program fronts, Boeing will bid on the presidential helicopter program, Cunningham confirmed. And Masiello answered one of the most important questions surrounding the whole idea: can a V-22 land on the White House lawn: “It fits, by the way.”


Kinda scary if you ask me if that is the criteria are for having a presidential helicopter. I know, stop being funny, they have more criteria. Allow me my fun, okay. The V-22 Osprey has had, well, how do you put this and be nice, a rough development process. For those who don’t know, this is a tilt-rotor aircraft. What it does is take off as a helicopter, and then the rotors tilt down and it flies off into the sunset like a plane. From the Reuters news wire:

The V-22 program was nearly canceled after several deadly accidents during its development, but officials say it is now winning kudos for the unusual capabilities it offers.

If I remember right, it took years to get into service, was way over budget and had those accidents but it is being fielded now, mostly by the Marines and so far, according to several articles I have read, including this one from Reuters, the DOD is pleased with the aircraft. (From Wikipedia)

A Government Accountability Office study reported that by January 2009 the Marines had 12 MV-22s operating in Iraq and they managed to successfully complete all assigned missions. The same report found that the V-22 deployments had mission capable rates averaging 57% to 68% and an overall full mission capable rate of only 6%. It also stated that the aircraft had shown weakness in situational awareness, maintenance, shipboard operations and the ability to transport troops and external cargo.[71] That study also concluded that the “deployments confirmed that the V-22’s enhanced speed and range enable personnel and internal cargo to be transported faster and farther than is possible with the legacy helicopters it is replacing”.

Still to have the Osprey as the presidential helicopter? But hey, it can do one thing — fit on the lawn. Apparently, that’s very important, or at least important enough to be the only thing mentioned as a reason in the six or so articles I read about this. Well, I guess if the Pentagon is happy with the plane, then it might be good enough for Marine One, the cal sign of the prez’ helo fleet. It would be a change huh. Imagine Richard Nixon walked up to an Osprey instead of a helicopter. see, hard to picture. The idea apparently came up last month from a military think tank out in Virgina which was looking at the aircraft to see how versatile it was.

Here’s a brief synopsis of the Osprey from Wikipedia.

Andy Kravetz

Author: Andy Kravetz


6 thoughts on “Possible presidential helicopter-plane”

  1. I knew of the problems and the crashes and the generally negative attitude many had to the tilt rotor. Yet, I am hearing okay things out of the ‘Stan regarding the V-22.

    The gun was moved from the front (then a Gatling) to a belly turret, I believe. Is it a mini gun now or simply an M2? or do you know?

  2. It’s a GAU-17 7.62 mm machine gun for the belly turret (remote operated). You can also mount an M-240 (7.26 mm machine gun) or an M-2 (.50-cal) on the rear ramp.

    This makes it like most helicopters–the UH-60 has door guns on both sides, and the CH-47 has guns out both sides and the ramp.

  3. Is the belly turret electric or is it a manual operated? Also, I saw something on 240 today. There is a new version, the 240L which is lighter. Is that just an infantry weapon or can it mounted on other things such as Humvees or planes or copters. I know the Marines have their 240G which is spercial to their mounts. Why I don’t know?

  4. The Osprey belley turret is electrically operated.

    I’m not certain about the 240L. The regular M-240G can be configured for door gunnery purposes or for ground configurations. It’s a neat feature in case you get shot down. The crew chief can–in about a minute–swich out the grip and trigger assembly and fire it like a normal machine gun.

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