France's DGA Orders Two Additional Five-Bladed Airbus H145 Helicopters

(17 Dec 2021)  The French Armament General Directorate (Direction Générale de l'Armement / DGA) has ordered two additional five-bladed Airbus H145 helicopters for the Sécurité Civile, an agency of the French Ministry of Interior that performs rescue and air medical transport services throughout France.

This new order is a follow-up to the contract signed in 2020 for an initial batch of two H145s which were delivered in December 2021.

“The Sécurité Civile has launched an ambitious, multi-year programme to modernise its means of intervention in order to adapt to the evolution and demands of our public service missions,” said Prefect Alain Thirion, Director General of the Sécurité Civile. “We operate day and night from our 23 bases in France and overseas territories. On average, one person is rescued every 33 minutes by one of our “Dragon” helicopters and these two new aircraft will reinforce the operational capacity of the men and women of the French Sécurité Civile throughout France.”

France's DGA has ordered two additional five-bladed Airbus H145 helicopters for the Sécurité Civile

Certified by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency in June 2020, this new version of Airbus’ best-selling H145 light twin-engine helicopter brings a new, innovative five-bladed rotor to the multi-mission helicopter, increasing the useful load by 150 kg while delivering new levels of comfort, simplicity, and connectivity.

Powered by two Safran Arriel 2E engines, the H145 is equipped with full authority digital engine control (FADEC) and the Helionix digital avionics suite.

The helicopter features a high performance 4-axis autopilot, increasing safety and reducing pilot workload. Its particularly low acoustic footprint also makes the H145 one of the quietest helicopters in its class.

Today, Airbus has more than 1,515 H145 family helicopters in service around the world, logging a total of more than six million flight hours.

“We are proud to be providing the Sécurité Civile with two more five-bladed H145s. This follow-up to the contract signed in the frame of the French stimulus plan for the aerospace industry offers Airbus Helicopters visibility while we navigate this global health and economic crisis,” said Bruno Even, Airbus Helicopters CEO. “The new five-bladed H145 will be an asset to the critical missions that the Sécurité Civile performs as we have seen during the various waves of the pandemic and flooding in France.”

Established in 1957, the helicopter division of the Sécurité Civile operates a fleet of 33 EC145 helicopters on call 24/7 throughout France for rescue missions.