One of the most ambitious programs ever initiated to transform military aviation through advanced stealth capabilities and a very modern design was the Sikorsky-Boeing RAH-66 Comanche. The Comanche is a stealthy reconnaissance and attack helicopter developed for the United States Army, envisioned to carry out missions by replacing many helicopters already aging in service, mostly the Bell UH-1 “Huey” and the Bell AH-1 “Cobra.”.
The RAH-66 Comanche was an engineering marvel with its sleek, angular fuselage, composite materials, and radar-absorbent coatings to minimize RCS. It was designed to be agile and maneuverable: truly fast at over 200 miles per hour, yet able to hover at high altitude. The helicopter was armed with a 20mm cannon, Hellfire missiles, and Hydra 70 rockets; it is also fitted with a nose-mounted sensor turret equipped with a FLIR camera, a laser rangefinder, and a target designator.
For all its proud design and capabilities, the Comanche program was troubled by cost overruns and technical problems. When the program was canceled in 2004, almost $7 billion had already been invested. It was one of the largest cancelations in U.S. Army history and outlined a changed military priority toward UAVs and other technologies more suitable for meeting the shifting requirements of modern warfare.
General Peter Schoomaker, then-Army Chief of Staff, said about the time of the program’s cancellation, “It’s a big decision, but we know it’s the right decision.” The Pentagon had too many big-ticket weapons projects in the works than it could afford, and the rising popularity of unmanned aircraft for surveillance and attack missions only furthered the reasoning behind the decision.
Development of the Comanche took off at the beginning of the 1980s while the Cold War was rampant and was focused on being a stealthy rotary attack aircraft that would replace the Army’s aging fleet. The helicopter comes with fully-powered internal bays designed for carrying anti-armor and anti-air missiles. It was to be the world’s first purpose-built stealth attack helicopter.
The first RAH-66 Comanche prototype was rolled out by Sikorsky Aircraft in Stratford, Connecticut, on May 25, 1995, and made its maiden flight on January 4, 1996. However, over the next eight years, the program advanced at a very slow rate, and it was finally canceled on 23 February 2004 as part of a realignment of Army Aviation.
Bob Mitchell, a curator of the U.S. Army Aviation Museum, hailed the Comanche as “a revolutionary design” that incorporated new technologies like radar absorption and defeating geometrics. This combat helicopter was designed with low radar and infrared profiles against radar-guided and infrared-guided missiles.
Though canceled, the RAH-66 Comanche left behind a long legacy: its design and technology influenced the development of other stealth aircraft, such as the F-22 Raptor and the F-35 Lightning II. It also validated a number of aircraft systems and components from its two flight-test prototypes, which are on display at the United States Army Aviation Museum, Fort Rucker, Alabama.
Although full production was never under way for the Comanche, its radical design and intrigue surrounding its development and eventual cancellation assure it will be quite a subject of interest among military aviation enthusiasts and model collectors. It does live on in the form of the line of stealth aircraft that followed and is still of great interest to those who follow the evolution of the modern military helicopter.