First flight for Bell 505 Jet Ranger X

first flight of Bell 505 Jet ranger X with Bell 429 WLG

The Bell 505 Jet Ranger X helicopter has performed its first flight from the company’s manufacturing facility in Mirabel, Québec (Canada).

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Matt Hasik, senior vice president of commercial programmes at Bell Helicopter, says: “Bell Helicopter pioneered the short light single market, and here we are nearly fifty years later, changing the way the world flies once again.”

“We have seen tremendous response from the market for the Bell 505 and today’s exciting flight marks another step toward delivering the high-performance, high-value aircraft our customers have been asking for,” adds Hasik.

Yann Lavalle, senior flight test pilot at Bell Helicopter, says: “The Bell 505 performed exactly as anticipated today. I am excited to be a part of the history of the Jet Ranger legacy, an aircraft that defined the market nearly 50 years ago.”

“We hovered in the Bell 505, performed a low-speed controllability assessment and flew two laps in the local traffic pattern. Our top speed today was 60 knots, and the entire flight lasted approximately 30 minutes,” adds Eric Emblin, senior flight test pilot at Bell Helicopter.

Bell Helicopter unveiled the Jet Ranger X at Heli-Expo 2014 in February and has already received more than 240 letters of intent for the new helicopter.

Bell released a video of the first flight