Late January 2024, reports appeared that Australia had started to scrap decommissioned MRH90 Taipan multirole helicopters, Airbus interested in acquisition of parts. This process evolved simultaneously with the scandal that Australia, under various pretexts, refused to transfer these helicopters to Ukraine, even despite a publicly voiced request from Kyiv.
Now this story has a continuation, more than six months afterward. According to Janes, NHIndustries, the manufacturer of the NH90 military helicopter, has received 300 out of the 4,000 MRH-90 Taipan components purchased from the Australian side; the first deliveries took place in September 2024.
Read more: Australian NH90 Taipan Transport Helicopter Retirement Takes Unexpected Turn
The MRH90 Taipan, as a localized variety of the NH90, contains about a few thousand components that could be removed to support other helicopters of the product line, operated across the world. The most important ones are broken down in the graphic above, provided by Janes. There were speculations that a prior agreement on the supply of these parts was the reason why Australia ignored Ukraine's requests.
An interesting detail in this context is that the Australian military was once forced to temporarily withdraw MRH90 Taipans from service specifically due to shortage of components for maintenance. Issues related to maintenance were also the factor that made Sweden and Norway rule out the possibility of acquiring baseline NH90 back in the day, cementing its status as a "problematic helicopter."
In a comment to Janes, Axel Aloccio, the CEO of the NHIndustries, admitted that the spare parts dismantled from the Australian helicopters are already "used in the wider support program," for NH90 operators, where they are sold at a discount. He said this was a solution to the shortage of components for the NH90 series.
Against this background, it is quite telling that now countries, mostly from the Middle East, are now lining up to get these helicopters, with a hundred units queued up on the production lines for the next within 18 months.
Still the question lingers, although now purely retrospective: would it not be more profitable to transfer these same MRH-90 Taipans to Ukraine answering the open request, and thus create a new long-term customer, with opportunities for further development and orders from the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
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