The Warzone/The Drive: The Marines Have Finally Received Their First Monster CH-53K King Stallion Helicopter
Now the service is looking for ways to trim back the massively expensive helicopter's costs as it works to get its first unit operational in 2019.
The U.S. Marine Corps has taken delivery of its first CH-53K King Stallion heavy lift helicopter. After years of setbacks and delays, and amid new concerns about schedule slips, the service is still hoping to eventually buy as many as 200 of the choppers to replace its fleet of aging and increasingly unreliable CH-53E Super Stallions.
On May 16, 2018, the initial Marine CH-53K touched down at Marine Corps Air Station New River in North Carolina. Sikorsky, now part of Lockheed Martin, built the helicopter, which is now set to begin a so-called "Supportability Test Plan" to help determine the logistical requirements to maintain and sustain the aircraft. The Marines expect to reach initial operational capability with the type by the end of 2019.
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WNU Editor: At a cost of $122 million per unit ($80 million per unit when production begins to build 200 of them) .... they are not cheap. But something has to replace the increasingly unreliable CH-53E Super Stallions.
