PERU – Acquire Military Transport Antonov AN-178

SpetsTechnoExport won tender to produce An-178 aircraft for Peru: Commercial and technical details

Ukraine’s defense export company SpetsTechnoExport (a part of the state-run concern UkrOboronProm) has won a major contract to produce the newest Antonov An-178 military transport aircraft for the Interior Ministry of Peru.

The Ukrainian plane prevailed over two competitors, the Italian-American Leonardo C-27J Spartan and C-295 produced by Airbus. The Ukrainian company was selected to produce an unspecified quantity of its An-178 planes that would replace older An-32B transporters, also produced by the Antonov for the Latin America.

The Peruvian tender evaluated the performance characteristics, delivery terms, extended warranties, personnel training, and other social and manufacturing preferences proposed by the bidders. The Ukrainian bid presented by the SpetsTechnoExport company offered a $65 million deal and gained 80.02 points. The Leonardo C-27J Spartan presented by Italy at the same price obtained 66.22 points, while the Airbus C-295M offered by Spain scored 58.60 points.

Should be noted, that in 2017 the Antonov company was reorganized, and all its enterprises were transferred to the state defense concern Ukroboronrpom. Since that time, the production and commercial deals of Antonov company have been managed with participation of Ukroboronprom leadership and with direct support of the President of Ukraine.

An-178 entering international markets

The An-178 is one of Antonov’s most recent developments, that made its first flight on May 2015. The An-178 is designed for transportation of medium to maximum payloads from 15 to 18 tons. The new Ukrainian aircraft finds itself in the heavier payload category than the An-74 or Europe's C-27J and C-295. This segment of the marketplace is virtually vacant thus far, except for aging or obsolete An-12 and C-160 airlifters which all need a replacement.

The cargo compartment floor area of An-178 is amounted to 40 sq. m with loading ramp or 33 sq. m without it. In its cross section, the cargo bay in the An-178 is 2,746mm wide and 2,750mm high, which is clearly optimized for standard 2,440 x 2,440 mm shipping containers. If compared to the An-158 on which basis the An-178 was designed, the latter will have its center wing section enlarged and expanded.

The cockpit is designed for a crew of two pilots. The An-178, like each and all of Antonov-series military transport aircraft, can operate both on unpaved and concrete runways no shorter than 915 meters.

As part of its flight testing program in 2016, the An-178 successfully completed type certification tests at high angles of attack (HAA), including stall tests at different altitudes and with different positions of flap extension and landing gear.

During Q3 and Q4 2016, and Q1 2017, the An-178 was successfully tested with respect to loading/unloading of various cargo types. Three ?1097?2 military HMMWVs (High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle) were used in the tests in August 2016, as well as shipping containers and pallets in February 2017. The tests verified compliance with the specs in terms of loading/unloading, vehicle ingress/egress, and arrangement/fastening of shipping containers and pallets.

To present time, the An-178 has made more than two hundred flights. There is a firm order in place for ten An-178 aircraft from Azerbaijan’s Silk Way Airlines, and preliminary agreements have been reached to supply 25 airplanes to China’s Beijing A-Star Aerospace Technology Co, 30 to Saudi Arabia’s ?aqnia Aeronautics, and one to an Iraqi customer.

Ukrainian experts estimate the market for the An-178 at about 800 airplanes within the next 10 to 12 years.

It should be noted, at Farnborough Airshow 2018, Ukroboronprom defense industries group’s Antonov Company and a division of Boeing – Aviall Services, Inc. – signed a general terms agreement on cooperation in the production of the upgraded An-148, An-158, An-178 families.Within this cooperation, Aviall Services, Inc. will support supply chain, procurement and delivery of vendor items on behalf of Antonov to support the production of the mentioned newest aircraft and to provide further after-sale support. So now, Antonov customers all over the world will get new level of service of Ukrainian aircraft of these three types, including An-178.

Conception and missions

AN-178 is intended to fulfill the following main tasks:

·transportation of civil-purpose cargoes, IATA and seacontainers and pallets, engineering vehicles at regular and charter routes;

·participation in special and humanitarian missions;

·aeromedical transportation of sick and injured persons;

·transportation of troops with light vehicles and armaments;

·airdropping of paratroops, vehicles, cargoes and maintenance items.

AN-178 is intended to replace AN-12 and C-160 and provides with the following:

·full replacement through dimensions and cargo capacity;

·maximum efficiency owing to superiority by all flight and technical characteristics;

·reduction of operating cost owing to installation of two turbojets instead of four or two turboprops;

·correspondence to all modern requirements and standards due to airborne equipment and avionics of a new generation.