ANTI-SHIP HELICOPTER

This helicopter is a naval military version of AS-365 Dauphin 2, a civil helicopter made by Eurocopterin the 1970s. It rolled out in June 1987, as SA-365M Panther within the context of the market for replacing French Army's Gazelles. It was equipped with two Turboméca TM-333 (900 hp each one) turboshafts. The Tiger won the competition and the Panther was re-motorized with Arriel turboshafts. The machine was bought by Saudi Arabia. It is equipped with two Turboméca Arriel 1 MN of 760 hp.

The French Navy bought between 1994 and 1998, fifteen examples to equip its Floréal class small-weight frigates and Lafayette class stealth-frigates. First airframes arrived in 1994 at NAS St-Mandrier and had first operated within the 35F squadron. They have been transfered on September 22nd 1995 to the 36F and operate from the following warships :

• FF La Fayette (F 710) since December 1st 1994.
• FF Surcouf (F 711).
• FF Courbet (F 712).
• FF Aconit (F 713).
• FS Floreal (F 730).
• FS Prairial (F 731).
• FS Nivôse (F 732).
• FS Ventôse (F 733).
• FS Vendémiaire (F 734).
• FS Germinal (F 735).
• FF Cassard since 1996 (D 614).
• FF Jean Bart (D 615).

French airframes are not equipped with any weapon yet (Saudi Arabian examples have AS-15 TT anti-ship missiles). Several AS-565s, embarked aboard FF Cassard during Kosovo crisis in March-June 1999. They were integrated in the TF-470, organized around the CV Foch.

  Specifications :

/	(US)	(FR)
LENGTH	38 ft 1 in	11. 6 m
ROTOR DIAMETER	39 ft 2 in	11. 9 m
HEIGHT	13 ft	3. 9 m
WEIGHTS	4 971 lb (empty)/ 9 369 lb (full)	2 255 kg (empty)/ 4 250 kg (full)
MAX SPEED	184 mph	296 km/ h
RANGE	472 nm	875 km (4 hours)
POWER	1 566 shp	1 168 kW

1/ Missions

• Designation of beyond the horizon objectives for the MM-40 Exocet surface-to-surface missile.
• Transporting Navy commandos.
• SAR (Search And Rescue).
• Anti-ship missions (Panthers will be equipped with a new kind of missile).

2/ Equipments

• AA-52 gun.
• 'Harpoon'.
• ORB-32 radar (range : 200 nm).
• Doppler radar.
• Folding rotor.
• Windlass.
• Nadir Mk 2 navigation calculator.
• GPS.
• Titus data system.
• UHF (mode Have Quick II).
• IFF mode 4.
• FLIR 'Chlio'.