Matthew Nelson
A partnership between Boeing and Textron's Bell subsidiary has completed delivery of its 400th V-22 Osprey tiltrotor, a joint service multirole combat aircraft designed to combine a helicopter's vertical performance with a fixed-wing platform's speed and range.
The team reached the milestone after delivering a CV-22 unit to U.S. Air Force Special Operations Command, Boeing said Wednesday.
The variant is built to support infiltration, resupply, extraction and other missions that cannot be supported by conventional aircraft.
Delivery of the first Osprey happened May 24, 1999. Currently, the Bell Boeing team produces the vehicle for U.S. and foreign military sales customers via the $5B Multi-year Procurement III contract that runs through 2024.
The V-22 aircraft has logged over 500K flight hours in humanitarian, combat and special operations missions worldwide to date.
