US Army receives 2 Apache trainer helicopters from Boeing

The Boeing Company delivered two new Apache Longbow Crew Trainers (LCT) to the U.S. Army at Fort Hood, Texas, and the Army declared the helicopter simulators "ready for training" on Sept. 4. These LCTs reflect the Apache Extended Block II configuration, ensuring concurrency with the latest AH-64D Apache Longbow helicopter capabilities. "The Army and Boeing have had a significant collaboration of efforts in order to reach this point," said Randy Nielson of the Army's Apache program office. "The LCT brings extraordinary training capabilities to the warfighter". The LCT simulates the aircraft's fully integrated avionics and weapons systems, including a state-of-the-art modem that transmits real-time battlefield information to air and ground forces. Additionally, these LCTs incorporate a new image generator that provides an eightfold increase in terrain- and cultural-feature fidelity, giving the aviator a more realistic virtual environment to support mission rehearsal. "The LCTs at Fort Hood incorporate a new architecture that improves the reliability and maintainability of the devices to ensure that they are always ready to meet the warfighter's training needs," said Mark McGraw, Boeing vice president of Training Systems & Services. The devices use rack-mounted computers for the Mission Display Processor Operational Flight Program software, eliminating the need for expensive aircraft equipment that can be difficult to maintain. The amount of wires and cables on the LCTs also has been reduced with the integration of a new distributed Input/Output system, which results in reduced manufacturing work and improved maintainability.