BELL’S FUTURE LONG-RANGE ASSAULT AIRCRAFT ENTERS MILESTONE B

The Milestone B decision is a part of the Major Capability Acquisition process and comes after years of the Bell team working alongside the U.S. Army and Bell’s FLRAA teammates to decompose requirements, reduce risk and inform the weapon system acquisition. This includes the execution of the Preliminary Design Review (PDR) ensuring integration and effectiveness of the aircraft’s design including weapon system design, sustainment and system integrations that are integral to the U.S. Army’s special mission requirements.

Following the U.S. Army’s FLRAA contract award in December 2022, Bell established several new state-of-the-art facilities and established several new innovative manufacturing processes to drive cost, schedule and performance to support the program’s execution. As Bell and the FLRAA team enter into the EMD phase, Bell’s focus will be on continued design maturation and prototyping.

The U.S. Army’s new long-range assault aircraft will fly twice as far and twice as fast as the current fleet. By utilizing mature tiltrotor technology coupled with an innovative digital engineering approach and an open architecture, it will be the most reliable, affordable and high-performing long-range assault aircraft in the world.