CH-146 helicopter facelift | A project of 800 million, benefits difficult to quantify

Bell Textron Canada will pilot an 800 million project to extend the life of the Royal Canadian Air Force’s 85 CH-146 Griffons, but only 9 helicopters will land at the multinational’s Mirabel plant to undergo a rejuvenation.

Julien Arsenault
The Press

Several questions remained unanswered on Monday after a ceremony at the helicopter manufacturer’s facilities to confirm the award of the contract. It was not possible to get an idea of ​​the financial benefits for Bell Textron Canada and the percentage of the work that will be done on Quebec soil.

The only certainty is that subcontractors established across the country will be entitled to their share of the cake. The Canadian subsidiary of the Texan multinational will extend the useful life of nine helicopters in order to have an idea of ​​the steps that will have to be followed by the subcontractors who will be selected.

“The other 76 [hélicoptères] will be distributed to partners across Canada”, confirmed the president of Bell Textron Canada, Steeve Lavoie, in a press briefing, alongside the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Philippe Champagne, as well as the President and CEO of Aéro Montréal, Suzanne Benoît.

Bell Textron Canada will therefore be the prime contractor for the project. The CH-146 Griffon is a variant of the Bell 412 EP civilian model. The company delivered 100 aircraft to National Defense between 1995 and 1997. These helicopters are used in tactical transport missions, emergency response and search and rescue operations.

Awarding the contract to Bell was practically a formality, since the company still owns the intellectual property rights to these devices.

“It allows us to do that [la mise à niveau] faster because the helicopters will be delivered between 2024 and 2028,” said Mr. Champagne, to justify his government’s approach. “Lifetime is going to take us to the mid-2030s.”

Who will win contracts?

The helicopter facelift will mainly concern communication, navigation and surveillance systems. Improvements also need to be made to the engines, which are built by Pratt & Whitney. The multinational, which is present in Longueuil, in the southern suburbs of Montreal, should be there.

The subcontractors will be selected following calls for tenders, Bell explained.

“They will be trained on how to perform Bell’s modifications and processes,” said Marc Bigaouette, the company’s senior director of global fleet services, in an interview with The Press. “Bell will receive the funds [800 millions] and transfer them to Canadian industry. »

In Quebec, Héli-Inter, based in Saint-Hubert, in the southern suburbs of Montreal, is certified to carry out maintenance on 412 aircraft manufactured by Bell Textron. Its president, Frédéric Allard, hopes to see his company get work. However, few Quebec players are sufficiently equipped to carry out large-scale work, he believes. These tasks are therefore likely to be carried out outside the province.

« Alpine Aerotech [Colombie-Britannique] should pick up the bulk of the contracts, underlines Mr. Allard in a telephone interview with The Press. They are already official Bell suppliers for the 412. Eagle Copter [Calgary] should also be in the ranks. We will do it on a case by case basis. In major updates, we don’t have the infrastructure to do this. »

Bell Textron Canada has approximately 1,300 employees in Mirabel, which includes some 150 hires made in recent months. The company added maintenance activities to its service offering last year. Its Quebec workforce was already nearly 2,000 people, but the end of the last decade had been marked by a few waves of layoffs, which had caused the number of workers to plunge.