With 30-plus helicopters, McDermott Aviation operates the largest privately owned helicopter fleet in Australia. Company President John McDermott now intends to commence new-build production of the 214ST; a medium-lift utility machine originally produced by Bell from 1981 to 1993. He explained his reasons for this ambitious project to HeliOps’ Ned Dawson.

The Bell 214ST was originally conceived as a military offering with greatly enhanced hot-and-high capability, the development of which was funded by the Iranian government. After the Shah of Iran was deposed, the model was eventually produced as a civil aircraft with a subsequent military version added and a total of 96 examples were produced. McDermott Aviation owns around 14 flyable original 214STs, and the type is still one of the most capable medium-lift helicopters flying today despite being out of production for over thirty years.

Based on the Bell 214B, the ST incorporates many significant enhancements and boasts a wider, stretched fuselage, increased endurance and a pair of 1,625 shp GE CT7-2A powerplants replacing the original single Lycoming LTC-4 engine. The increased power enables the bigger Bell to operate at maximum gross weight up to 10,000ft, and the larger cabin can seat 16-18 passengers. McDermott Aviation acquired the type certificate for the 214ST in 2021, and according to John McDermott, major progress has been made towards putting a new version of the type into production.

New Build

So why consider building new examples of a design that is more than forty years old? McDermott chose the ST because it’s proven, single-pilot VFR and an easy aircraft to maintain. He is adamant that the aircraft has much to offer the utility and firefighting segments, commenting, “There’s a need for them in the market because there is currently no purpose-built medium-heavy utility helicopter in production. Bell is still building the 412, which is a brilliant helicopter, but it’s a light-medium, and we need something in the 2,000 to 3,000kg range at least, and that’s the 214ST.” He pointed out that the airframe is well-proven over more than forty years of operation, flying hundreds of thousands of hours with a demonstrated high level of reliability.

According to McDermott, what really started the whole project was a desire to bid on supplying aircraft to various government agencies around the world and he commented that most governmental purchasing protocols require that they only purchase brand-new aircraft. Although the ST’s design may be forty-plus years old, the new McDermott STs will be brand-new builds of the proven, robust and certified airframe, eliminating the expensive, drawn-out process of going through the certification process for a new design. “Because the OEMs are not building any new mediums or larger, we’re doing what no one else is,” he remarked.

McDermott is enthusiastic about Bell’s record of building strong, resilient aircraft, and he remarked, “In my opinion, the European market in particular now is going for lightweight, plastic, sexy, pretty helicopters, but they just don’t have the robustness that we need for aerial firefighting.” The new 214STs are intended for all types of utility work and will incorporate several changes from the original design, as McDermott outlined. “We’ve definitely ‘dumbed them down’ from the original ST, and we have a fair amount of leeway because we own the type certificate. We’ve taken off the fly-by-wire elevator system because, although it was ahead of its time, it was an item that was notorious for giving problems. We’ve lightened it right down by keeping it simple, and although that’s dropped the Vne to 120kts, once you fit a firefighting tank and/or winches, the Vne is going to be lower than the OEM’s original limit anyway.

Enhanced

The new STs will get a glass cockpit, and as McDermott stated, “We’re building for Day VFR/Night NVG capability, but the avionics provider also offers a basic autopilot system, and we are going to have an IFR option if people want to go that way. It is going to be an addition, though, because it’s not the market we’re chasing.” He related that the intended market was everything in the utility sector that operators are currently using Black Hawks, Hueys, 412s and 212s. “There’s a big push to get away from legacy helicopters, whether that’s justifiable or not,” he added and acknowledged that all the UH-60 Black Hawks coming on the market are 1980s vintage or thereabouts, built on the original S-70’s 1970 design. “If people keep buying older used aircraft, the investment is not justified for OEMs to build new aircraft in a very limited market.”

The 214ST’s GE CT7 is a proven engine, and McDermott will install the latest versions – the CT7-2E or the -F1. The engines are in current production and already operating in other types, the 2-E fitted to the AW189 and AW149 while the 2-F1 powers the Bell 525. The fact that the 213ST is a Bell design is another factor that encouraged McDermott to proceed with the project, and he explained, “The beauty of the Bell product is that you can take your components to any approved maintenance facility for overhaul, so you’re not relying on OEMs to turn around your component overhauls. That keeps your direct operating costs down and gives you greater control of your aircraft.”

Transport Category

While used Black Hawks are capable and popular in the second-hand market, they can only operate in the restricted category under various restrictions and limitations, including no carriage of passengers - other than mission-critical personnel under public use. As the 214ST is a certified design in the transport category, it has no such limitation and boasts the significant additional benefit that Bell parts are available new, whereas Sikorsky will not supply new UH-60 parts to the civilian market, only S-70 parts and Blackhawk operators are therefore heavily reliant on the continuation of ex-military availability. Nevertheless, buyers of used Black Hawks are not the operators who would be likely to buy a new ST. McDermott stated that ST buyers are those who are potential buyers of new aircraft such as the EC145, S-70, AW139 or H225. “Buyers of those machines get top dollar because they are a post-2020 build and the new technology qualifies for higher rates.”
In its firefighting role, the 214ST becomes a Type-1 heavy helicopter, and McDermott commented that currently, only approximately 65 per cent of the world’s demand for Type-1 helicopters and larger heavy fixed-wing assets is being met. The 214ST’s performance stacks up spectacularly well against its potential competitors. The EC145, for example, comes in around $5 million cheaper but carries just 1,400kgs, whereas the ST carries 3,200kgs on the hook, more than twice the weight. “Our operating costs are a lot lower too,” advised McDermott. “We have power by the hour on the engines, the transmissions have a very generous overhaul life and they can be overhauled in your own approved facility if you have one. You can’t even touch the main-rotor gearbox on the 145. At the moment, if you own a 412 you can’t even carry as much water as a Huey, so realistically you’re being compared to a Huey in terms of productivity but you’re paying a lot more. Working on eight hours a day, six lifts an hour, an H225 will do 320 hours of actual firefighting in forty days and then it’s transmission is due for overhaul at one and a half million bucks a time, because of its lifting cycle limitations,” he noted. “We don’t have that with the 214’s transmission. We do have a number of RINs (retirement index numbers) for some of our components based on landing or lift cycles but not nearly to the same level as the European aircraft.”

Price Point

McDermott advised that he envisaged a price point in the region US$20 million, not much more than a new Bell 412, although he has high hopes of coming in under that figure. The ST, however, can carry significantly greater payloads, hook loads and passenger numbers. He did describe the US certification system for more than nine passengers as ‘a pain in the backside’ but pointed out that most teams typically carried for firefighting or other utility projects usually consist of nine members or less, although the ST’s cabin can legally carry up to eighteen passengers.

Fire agencies throughout Europe work through Rescue EU, coordinating assets to prepare for major fires anywhere in Europe and McDermott commented that Rescue EU is looking to bolster its available firefighting capability significantly. He admitted that although he will be happy to sell to customers in the US and has already had serious enquiries from private operators there, he envisages Europe as a key target market. “Rightly or wrongly, Europe has pushed hard for twin-engined operations, and you can’t argue with it if it’s what the customer demands.”

Production

When production starts on the STs, Crestview Aerospace will build the cabins and airframes. Crestview is highly experienced, with more than 600 CH-47 Chinook fuselage sections built and delivered and 150 UH-1Y cabin sections built at a capacity of 18 units annually. Their experience with the Bell UH-1 series and large-scale design, tooling and production make them the ideal choice for the 214ST’s construction. Crestview’s location adjacent to the Florida/Alabama border is also highly advantageous, as McDermott Aviation owns a large facility in Alabama that was acquired as a heavy maintenance base for its 214ST fleet and which will be the final assembly site for the new 214STs.

“This is a walk in the park for Crestview,” opined McDermott. “We’ve already got about 90 percent of the tooling we’re going to need. We’re hopeful that we’ll start building them this year and maybe late 2026 or early 2027 we’ll see our first cabin. The first five aircraft we produce will probably be for us and we’ll put a lot of our existing component stock into them off our shelves.” McDermott has new ST tail-rotor blades being produced by a US company that will also produce the main rotor blades. “We have almost all the tooling we need for the main rotor blades; all we need to get is an industrial winder, because they’re a wound blade,” he explained. It is hoped that by late 2027 or early 2018, the first production 214STs should enter the market.

The first of the new builds may not be fitted with the new version engines, although McDermott reported that the process is underway to get the new engines fitted to the existing ST fleet and the STC issued. “We’re trying to circumvent things that we know are going to be obstacles. The new CT7 variants are FADEC engines, and the 214ST is not a FADEC-interface airframe, so we reckon that’ll take at least eighteen months,” he explained. The McDermott fleet also includes many 214Bs, so the new ST design will include a rotor-head that will fit both the ST and the 214B, increasing parts commonality and reducing parts inventory. The rotor mast, grips and heads will also now all be common across the 214 fleet and identical in every respect to the same items in the military’s AH-1W.

“We’ve had 214Bs since 2002 and the STs since 2010. We know what it takes to operate them and make money from them. We’ve logged over 50,000hrs on them, and that’s what separates us from the OEMs.” When the new STs are available, McDermott intends to offer them from a ‘one-stop-shop’, with all additional equipment for utility operations available as options, including winches, the 3,200ltr Helitac firefighting tank and sea snorkel. “The sea snorkel will definitely only be available as an option though, not because we don’t want to supply it but because we don’t want to give it to people without the proper training, otherwise they’ll end up in the water,” he advised.

So, what can a buyer of McDermott’s new 214ST expect? Firstly, forget that it’s a design from decades ago. The new builds will be entirely new aircraft. Everything in them will be brand-new or zero-time, from the airframe to the avionics, engines, combining gearbox, rotors and electrics. Reliability and serviceability are well proven globally over hundreds of thousands of hours on the original version and it offers performance to challenge any other new aircraft at the price point. It is a simplified, robust workhorse that boasts 3,200kgs of water on each drop in the firefighting role, with up to 16-18 people carried in the large cabin, and it is exceptionally hot and high-performance. If John McDermott has his way, the medium-heavy utility market is about to get a major shake-up in the near future.