Company A ‘Aces’ of the 1st Battalion, 214th Aviation Regiment’s (A/1-214th AVN) at Wiesbaden Army Airfield in central Germany received an initial batch of three Sikorsky UH-60V Black Hawks on June 4, when the battlefield utility helicopters arrived aboard a USAF-operated Boeing C-17A Globemaster III.
The C-17A (serial 03-3115) departed Wiesbaden for Huntsville, Alabama, the following day, carrying three of the unit’s former UH-60M Black Hawk helicopters for the return trip. Tasked in the command aviation role, the ‘Aces’ had operated ten UH-60Ms since the initial three examples arrived at Wiesbaden in March 2018. The unit is a component of the 12th Combat Aviation Brigade (CAB), which is responsible for nearly all of the US Army’s Europe-based aviation assets.
The 214th AVN is the third unit to receive the UH-60V after deliveries to the Pennsylvania Army National Guard’s (ARNG’s) Eastern Army National Guard Aviation Training Site (EAATS) in July 2021 and the Illinois ARNG’s 1-106th AVN in January 2022. In total, 30 UH-60Vs will be delivered to the Illinois ARNG’s A/1-106th AVN at Decatur, B/1-106th AVN at Kankakee and the Georgia ARNG’s C/1-106th AVN at Winder by mid-2024.
Sikorsky’s UH-60V is an upgraded version of the earlier UH-60L and features a digital cockpit and integrated avionics suite developed by Northrop Grumman and the US Army. The conversion process is carried out at the US Army’s Corpus Christi Army Depot in Texas. Current plans call for the conversion of 760 UH-60Ls to the V-standard configuration, with deliveries being made to both active-duty and reserve component units.
