The Globe and Mail
Helicopters too light to carry heavy loads
By GLORIA GALLOWAY
Thursday, July 29, 2004 - Page A5
OTTAWA -- Some of the military helicopters the federal government has ordered for $5-billion will work from three huge new supply ships, but the choppers are too light to ferry heavy equipment and people off the new vessels.
The ships the government promised last April to buy at an estimated cost of $2.1-billion to replace the nation's two aging oil-replenishment ships will be built with helicopter hangars on deck. But the new Sikorsky H-92 helicopters won't have the requirements of the big vessels in mind.
"That's not why we're buying this helicopter," Alan Williams, the assistant deputy minister of National Defence, said at a recent press conference.
"This is not a transport helicopter," he said.
The first duty of the new ships, as described in a military press release, is transferring liquids and solids between ships at sea. "This under-way support also includes the operation of helicopters and a second line maintenance capability for helicopters," the release says.
The second duty will be to sealift up to 7,500 "lane metres" of vehicles and stores or an entire army battle group.
"Their ability to transport a significant amount of equipment, and transfer it to shore will give the Canadian Forces a critical sealift capability," then Defence Minister David Pratt said in announcing the purchase of the ships.
All of which would seem to suggest that ship-to-shore transport would be valuable. But Mr. Williams has said that the H-92s "represent the right helicopter for the Canadian Forces at the best price for Canadians."
"If we have to transport stuff, be they armoured vehicles or other kinds of equipment," he said, "we bring them to the local dock there and unload them. Nothing to do with helicopters."
If there are times when the ships can't dock, he said, then there will be other ways of unloading the cargo.
But Peter Stoffer, who was NDP defence critic when the purchase of the ships was announced in April, said the recent decision to buy helicopters makes no sense if they can't transport large amount of goods and people from the new supply ships to land-based missions.
"I don't think they have a clue, to be honest with you, regarding this helicopter purchase," Mr. Stoffer said, "and they probably haven't made any link, at least one that makes any sense, to the new vessels that they are talking about."
If they are going to put helicopters on the back of the new supply ships, "then they are going to have to get different helicopters in order to meet the needs," he said. Or "someone else is going to have to do it for us."
Major-General Andrew Leslie, who until recently was the deputy commander of the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan, has described on several occasions the need for "big honking helicopters" to effectively transport troops and conduct other associated sealift and support roles.
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