Rotorcraft Report: Frasca Builds Business In Offshore Segment

TRAINING

Frasca International marked the 50th anniversary of its incorporation at Heli-Expo by delivering a flight training device (FTD) for the Eurocopter EC135 to Era Helicopters and booking an order for a similar device from Bristow Group.

The Urbana, Ill. training products and services company is benefitting from rising demand from oil and gas companies for better-trained crews to fly their workers to offshore platforms and helicopter operators’ efforts to satisfy those demands. "As the demand for helicopter training grows, our experience in rotary-wing simulation enables us to deliver the best helicopter devices available," said Frasca Vice President John Frasca.

Era will use the Level 6 EC135 FTD at its new training center in Lake Charles, La.; it also plans to install a Frasca AS350B2 FTD there. Era’s EC135 FTD features Frasca’s TruVision Global visual system in a 200-deg display dome.

Bristow’s AS355 FTD will be designed and manufactured to meet the requirements of Joint Airworthiness Regulations Standard (JAR STD) 2H Flight Training Device 3 and JAR STD 3H Flight and Navigation Procedures Trainer 2 Multi-Crew Coordination. It is to be installed at Bristow’s Norwich operation in the United Kingdom, and will feature the TruVision visual system with a six-channel visual display providing a 200X70-deg field of view. Frasca’s flight test group will collect aerodynamic qualification data for the device through an extensive flight test program. Bristow also ordered full-flight simulators from Frasca for the Eurocopter EC225 and the Sikorsky Aircraft S-92. They are to be qualified as Level B devices and will be installed in Aberdeen, Scotland. — Thomas McKenna