TAI Helicopter Department VP Mehmet Demiroğlu during an interview with Defence Turk announced that naval variants of GOKBEY, ATAK 2 and T925 (10 ton Class Utility Helicopter) are being developed for use onboard TCG ANADOLU and other naval platforms:
“For ANADOLU and other platforms, we will be working on GOKBEY, 10 ton Class Utility Helicopter and ATAK 2’s navalized versions. It isn’t easy to navalize a helicopter’s design of course. Making rotors and the tail foldable requires serious changes on the design. We will start with designing helicopters for services such as Directorate General of Forestry and Land Forces and add the afformentioned features. We predict that a navalized GOKBEY will come out with 10 ton Class Utility Helicopter to follow.
We will be working on the studies regarding design changes to be made in second phases of our projects. Pre-developmental studies of said changes on the designs will shorten development phases from 4 years to about 1-2 years.”
Navalized GOKBEY can be regarded as a AW159 Wildcat counterpart in terms of its weight class and potential mission profile. It is possible to see a multirole navy helicopter capable of performing transport, ASuW, ASW and SAR missions. Coast Guard could also make use of GOKBEY due to lower acquirement and operating costs of lighter helicopters.
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