Australia to buy 40 Black Hawks through $656M contract modification awarded to Sikorsky

Australia will purchase 40 UH-60M Black Hawk helicopters as a result of a $656.8 million contract modification awarded to Sikorsky. The Army announced the award on Jan. 26.

In June 2022, Sikorsky, owned by Lockheed Martin, inked a $2.3 billion contract to provide the Army, other government agencies and foreign militaries with 120 Black Hawks through 2027. That contract included options for 135 additional aircraft, which would bring the total contract cost to $4.4 billion.

The contract for the Black Hawks being sent to Australia is part of the MYX contract awarded last year, according to Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Britt Rabinovici.

“On 26 Jan a contract was awarded with Sikorsky to exercise an option for 40 additional UH-60Ms off the current MYX contract to support an Australia Foreign Military Sales case,” she wrote in an email to Inside Defense.

Sikorsky President Paul Lemmo said in a statement that the UH-60M “provides the Australian Army with critical capabilities that will strengthen Australia’s readiness, interoperability and security for decades to come.”

Warren McDonald, chief executive of Lockheed Martin Australia, noted in a statement that Sikorsky Australia has been sustaining the Australian Defence Force’s Black Hawk and Seahawk helicopter fleets for more than 30 years.

“The addition of the UH-60M to the ADF fleet will generate positive economic opportunities for Australian Defence Industry across jobs creation, global supply chains and sovereign partnerships with regional small to medium enterprises,” he said.