New Nigerian
Air Force
Bell 412EP
inducted
Above: Bell 412EP NAF 600 comes in to land at Ikeja following a demonstration fl ight after its
formal induction into service on November 1. NAF
ONE OF two Bell 412EPs
newly acquired by the
Nigerian Air Force (NAF)
was formally inducted into
service at Ikeja, Lagos
International Airport, on
November 1, 2017. The
federal government had
handed over NAF 600,
along with a second
example, to the NAF on
January 27, 2017 after
being stored for the
previous two years.
Because of their lengthy
period of storage, it had
been necessary to restore
them to airworthiness
before they could enter
operational service. This
included major systems
and surveillance cameras
being sent to the US and
Canada for overhaul and
repairs, following which
the NAF’s 631 Aircraft
Maintenance Depot (ACMD)at Ikeja re-assembled
the components. The
second Bell 412EP is still
undergoing reactivation at
631 ACMD, but work is well
advanced and it should
also enter service shortly.
The helicopters, built in
2012, comprise N462UB
(c/n 36606) and N474NE
(c/n 36608), which had
been registered to Africair
Inc of Miami, Florida. Their
US registrations were
cancelled on September
9, 2015 after having been
ordered by Nigeria’s Rivers
State Government for aerial
monitoring and security
surveillance services of
oil and gas pipelines and
other facilities in the state.
Their delivery was initially
delayed due to failure to
obtain clearance for import
into Nigeria, leaving them
languishing at an airportin the US. Eventually,
they were airfreighted to
Lagos-Murtala Muhammed
International Airport and
stored at the facilities of
Skyways Aviation Handling
Company Ltd (SAHCOL)
there. However, due
to irregularities in their
paperwork, they were
detained by the authorities
and, despite a series of
letters from the Rivers State
Government during 2015
appealing for their release,
they remained in storage.
Finally, on November 3,
2016 the Office of the
National Security Advisor
gave approval for the NAF
to take custody of them
and to operate them.
Four days later, the
Nigerian Customs Service
officially seized them,
then handed them over to
the NAF. Dave AllportFive Huey IIs delivered to Uganda
BELL HELICOPTER has
completed production
of five UH-1H-II Huey IIs
for the Uganda Peoples’
Defence Force (UPDF) at its
facility in Ozark, Alabama,
where they were reworked
from US Army UH-1H
airframes. They departed
from Ozark for the US
Army facility in Huntsville,
Alabama on November 10.
They were then due to be
airfreighted to Uganda.
The helicopters had
already been fully
painted in UPDF colours
before leaving Ozark,
but still carried US
civil registrations. All
five have now been
confirmed as N296FA
(c/n 5820, ex 66-16126),N486PA (c/n 8515, ex
66-16321), N806YB (c/n
9293, ex 66-17099),
N810AS (c/n 4605, ex
64-13898) and N4869Z
(c/n 9317, ex 66-17123).
US Army Contracting
Command had awarded
Bell a $34.5m Foreign
Military Sales contract
for these helicopters on
September 26, 2016 (see
Huey IIs Ordered for Kenya
and Uganda, November
2016, p21). It was
announced at that time that
contract completion was
expected on December 29,- Original plans had
been for eight Huey IIs to
be delivered to Uganda,
but the final contract was
for just five. Dave Allport
Three ex-Slovak
Mi-24s for Senegal
DETAILS ARE finally
emerging of the origin of
the second-hand Mi-24Vs
that the Armée de l’Air
Sénégalaise (Senegalese
Air Force) has recently
acquired. Poland’s
Wojskowe Zakłady
Lotnicze Nr 1 (WZL-1)
overhaul facility in Lód ́z
has been overhauling
the helicopters prior to
delivery and the first
example, 6W-HCA,
performed its acceptance
flight on January 12, 2017
(see Senegalese Hind
overhauled in Poland,
March 2017, p20).
It was then airfreighted
out of Lód ́z on February
8 on board Antonov
Airlines An-124 UR-82073
to Dakar-Yoff, prior to
entering service. Two
more, 6W-HCB and6W-HCD, were seen at
Lód ́z on November 14 and
August 3 respectively,
being test flown prior
to being delivered.
They departed Poland
on November 30.
It has now been
discovered that all three
are former Slovak Air
Force examples: 6W-HCA
is c/n 830708, ex Slovak
0708; 6W-HCB is c/n
730813 ex 0813; and
6W-HCD is c/n 730833,
ex 0833. Despite the
missing serial 6W-HCC,
no further helicopters
are being acquired.
These are the first
Mi-24s operated by
Senegal. However, two
Mi-35P variants, bought
direct from Russia, have
been in service since- Dave Allport
ALGERIAN AIR Force
(Al Quwwat Al Djawia Al
Djaza’eria/Force Aérienne
Algérienne) C-130H-30
7T-WHN (c/n 4894) was a
surprise visitor to Mehrabad
International Airport, Tehran,
in late October. The aircraft’smission remains unknown,
but it is understood to have
been transporting high-
ranking Algerian officials.
Algeria received its
first seven C-130H-30s
between July 1981 and
June 1984, and an eighthin November 1990. An
attrition loss occurred in
February 2014. Another
ten short-fuselage C-130Hs
were delivered between
March and September
1982, one of these being
lost in June 2003.New H215 delivered to Lesotho Defence Force
A NEW Airbus Helicopters
H215 has been delivered to
the Lesotho Defence Force
(LDF). The acquisition wasrevealed by the Lesotho
News Agency on November
20, although it had been
commissioned into serviceon October 14 by Deputy
Prime Minister Monyane
Moleki, who said there
are plans to acquire morehelicopters in the future.
The H215, which has the
serial LDF-15, was acquired
through Airbus HelicoptersSouthern Africa and is
named Litsebe after a
mountain in the country’s
Berea area. Dave AllportAbove: The fi rst Senegalese Air Force Mi-24V, 6W-HCA,
being towed out to a waiting An-124 at Lód ́z, Poland, prior
to delivery on February 8, 2017. A further two have also
now been delivered. W Z L-1Keyvan TavakkoliAlgerian Hercules visits Iran
NEWS
22 // JANUARY 2018 #358 http://www.airforcesmonthly.com
Africa