The US Air Force is seeking market responses on upgrading the HH-60W Jolly Green II Combat Rescue Helicopter.
The service wants a low-cost anti-jamming and spoofing capability and mobile user objective system (MUOS) on the Sikorsky aircraft.
The MUOS is the US Navy’s next-generation satellite communications system that provides secure voice, video, and data communications for US forces across the globe.
The air force may seek to add more capabilities to the Jolly Green in the future. A potential contract is expected to span five to ten years.
Air Force Wants to Curtail Jolly Green’s Procurement
The air force announced in March that it would end the aircraft’s procurement plan after purchasing its last 10 HH-60Ws in the fiscal year 2023.
At 75, the fleet is 38 aircraft short of the service’s original plan to acquire 113 HH-60Ws due to the changing threat environment.
The aircraft will replace the fleet of 99 HH-60G Pave Hawk helicopters, inducted in the early 1980s.
US Congress Thinks Otherwise
“The scenarios that we’re most worried about are not the same as they once were,” Breaking Defense quoted Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall as saying in March.
“When we were doing counterinsurgencies, and we were losing pilots in those kinds of situations, the needs were different. The acts of aggression like we’re seeing in Europe, or we might see the Pacific … put us in a very different scenario.”
Meanwhile, the US Congress recently added $570 million to the air force’s budget of $1.2 billion to acquire the aircraft in 2023, doubling the number to be bought this year to 20.