In 21 April social media post the Polish Ministry of National Defence said that both Bell and Boeing had submitted offers with the best one to be selected, though no date for a contract award was mentioned. Bell Helicopter has been working with the Polish defense industry for the greater part of 2016. Poland received new offers from Bell for its Kruk attack helicopter program first for 32 helicopters to replace the Mi-24 Hind. The company organized a series of meetings with representatives from Polish aviation industries in order to create cooperation in support of the AH-1Z Viper in Poland.
Bell’s AH-1Z Viper will provide Poland with critical combat capability to defeat hostile armored formations and air to air superiority to engage offensive helicopter formations. The Viper is the only Attack Helicopter which teams with the F-35 under the US Marine Corps to operate seamlessly together to defeat air and ground threats. This already proven integration provides an operational concept for Poland to employ the F-35 with the AH-1Z Viper. Bell’s advanced fleet of purpose-built military and civil certified aircraft afford the best mix of capability and sustainability for all Polish helicopter modernization programs: Kruk, Perkoz, and Kondor.
Bell and Polish industry have initiated the march toward technology. Bell works closely with Seco Warwick and others in the Polish manufacturing industry to develop cutting edge metallic manufacturing technologies. This relationship will continue as Bell integrates this equipment and technology into the newly established Manufacturing Technologies Center (MTC). The MTC is an innovation center that will validate technology and manufacturing methodologies for Bell’s production of the next generation aircraft both in the civilian market and future vertical lift programs such as the V-280 Valor and 360 Invictus.
The Bell AH-1Z Viper is a twin-engine attack helicopter, based on the AH-1W SuperCobra, designed and produced by t Bell Helicopter. Being one of the latest members of the prolific Bell Huey family, it is also called “Zulu Cobra”, based on the military phonetic alphabet pronunciation of its variant letter. The AH-1Z was developed during the 1990s and 2000s as a part of the H-1 upgrade program on behalf of the United States Marine Corps (USMC). The AH-1Z and Bell UH-1Y Venom utility helicopter share a common tailboom, engines, rotor system, drivetrain, avionics architecture, software, controls and displays for over 84% identical components.
