Boeing claims they are confident that they will be building 48 year old helicopter Apache’s newest variant Echo for decades.
Boeing’s Apache AH-64E (Echo) is the latest variant of the Apache helicopter. The latest version of the Echo variant, version 6.5, was flown for the first time in October 2023.
Rick Lemaster, Senior Regional Director at Boeing talked to DefenseHere about the Echo variant of the Apache, stating that it was the best attack helicopter in the world.
Lemaster said: “You don’t have to believe me, you can talk to the militaries that are currently using it as they are training and preparing to defend their countries. You can see the newest version of this, the Echo model is actually out on the tarmac.
You’ll see it’s out on the flight line. You can talk to the Joint Aviation Command pilots that are out there that fly the aircraft and they’ll tell you why they believe it is also one of the premier helicopters in the world. The U.S. Army is going to continue to fly the Apache for the next 40 years. And while they’re making decisions on what those next replacement aircraft might be in that timeframe, they’re also working with us on what additional upgrades we’re looking to go put in place on this aircraft.
We just signed a multi-year contract with the U.S. Army that has a large number of aircraft, both newbuild as well as remanufacturing of the older Delta model helicopters for both the U.S. Army and other customers around the world. So we’re confident we’re going to be building these for decades to come, and we’re going to continue to be reinvesting in their capabilities to make them more effective.”