Republic of Korea Army UH-60P Helicopter Simulators Upgraded

South Korea’s defense procurement agency, the Defence Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA), has announced the completion of upgrades to the Republic of Korea Army’s (ROKA) UH-60 helicopter simulators.

In a release, DAPA stated the upgraded UH-60 simulators will significantly enhance the training environment for pilots responding to various tactical situations and improve emergency response capabilities. “This UH-60 simulator performance improvement is expected to greatly contribute to improving pilots’ skills by enabling safer and more realistic flight training,” Director of DAPA’s Basic Power Business Support Division, Senior Civil Servant Park Jeong-eun said.

The ROKA’s existing UH-60 simulators were originally inducted into service in 2000 and 2008. In recent years, they faced problems due to deterioration of image system performance due to age, obsolescence and increased software maintenance and repair costs.

DAPA managed the performance maximization project for UH-60 helicopter simulators, which resulted in the replacement of all image generation systems such as beam projectors and monitors to improve the screen quality, resolution, and three-dimensionality. The image computer and operating server were also replaced allowing load new terrain information to be incorporated such as satellite images. This also resulted in the reduction of initial startup time of the simulator to 10 minutes as compared to 30 minutes previously. The simulator modernization effort also worked on obsolescence management and introduction of domestic maintenance capability which will reduce operating and maintenance costs.

Between 1990-1999, the ROKA inducted 131 UH-60P Black Hawk helicopters, out of which 124 were produced under license by Korean Air.