The US State Department has approved the sale of 60 CH-47F Chinook helicopters to Germany for an estimated cost of $8.5 billion (€7.8 billion).
The contract as described by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) includes 20 spare T-55-GA-714A engines, an array of mission equipment and support, in addition to the 60 heavy-lift helicopters.
“The proposed sale will improve Germany’s heavy lift capability,” the DSCA explained. “Germany intends to use this enhanced capability to strengthen its homeland defense and deter regional threats.”
The Heavy Lift Helicopter (STH) program to replace the 60 CH-53G Stallion of the Bundeswehr was started in December 2017, with two manufacturers competing for the contract: Sikorsky, with the CH-53K King Stallion, and Boeing, with the CH-47F Chinook.
However, the program was terminated in 2020 when the German Ministry of Defense expressed dissatisfaction with the offers presented by Sikorsky and Boeing within the planned budgetary limits of €5.6 billion euros (equivalent to approximately $6.7 billion at the time).
The tender was relaunched, with the same competitors, and on June 1, 2022, the German government announced that it selected the Chinook over the King Stallion.
The industrial support network constituted by Boeing around the offer of the Chinook to Germany includes Airbus Helicopters, CAE Lufthansa Technik, Honeywell Aerospace and Rolls-Royce Deutschland.
In June 2022, Michael Hostetter, vice president of Boeing Defense, Space & Security in Germany, said the first Chinook CH-47F heavy-lift helicopters could be delivered as soon as 2026 if a contract was signed in early 2023.