Departure
86%
vs 95% ▼ 9
MY FS FLIGHTS
MY FS FLIGHTS
The Sikorsky MH-60S Seahawk, nicknamed the Knighthawk, is the US Navy's twin-engine combat support helicopter, a navalised derivative of the Black Hawk built within the wider Sikorsky S-70/H-60 family. It replaced the CH-46 Sea Knight in the fleet logistics role and flies alongside the dedicated anti-submarine MH-60R, giving it a place of interest to simmers who want the Navy's do-everything shipboard helicopter rather than the sensor-heavy hunter-killer variant.
The MH-60S Seahawk is a US Navy utility and combat support helicopter built by Sikorsky, part of the SH-60/MH-60 Seahawk family that itself derives from the US Army's UH-60 Black Hawk. Where the SH-60B, SH-60F, HH-60H and MH-60R variants were built around the dedicated Seahawk fuselage for anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare, the MH-60S is a hybrid: it marries the Black Hawk's main fuselage, complete with large sliding doors on both sides and a single tail wheel, to the Seahawk's folding tail, engines, drivetrain and rotors. It is unofficially known as the Knighthawk, a nod to the CH-46 Sea Knight it replaced in Navy service, though Seahawk remains its official Department of Defense name.
The MH-60S emerged from the Navy's long-running H-60 Seahawk programme, which began in the 1970s when the Navy adapted the Army's UH-60 Black Hawk airframe to meet its LAMPS Mk III requirement, resulting in the SH-60B with 83 percent commonality with the UH-60A. The MH-60S itself was developed as a combat support helicopter to succeed the ageing CH-46 Sea Knight, with a prototype designated YCH-60S converted to the MH-60S configuration in 2001. The first operational MH-60S squadron was Helicopter Combat Support Squadron Five (HC-5), homeported in Guam, and with the Sea Knight's retirement the Navy's squadron designation of Helicopter Combat Support Squadron (HC) was itself retired in favour of Helicopter Sea Combat (HSC) squadrons. Production of the MH-60S ran until 2015, building toward a fleet total of 275 aircraft, within a broader SH-60/MH-60 family production run of 938 airframes. The type has also been exported, with Lockheed Martin delivering MH-60S helicopters to Thailand in August 2011 in the type's first international delivery.
The MH-60S is built around the Black Hawk's main fuselage, retaining large sliding cabin doors on both sides and a single tail wheel at the rear, rather than the dedicated Seahawk fuselage used on the SH-60B and MH-60R. Onto this airframe are grafted the Seahawk family's folding tail, engines, drivetrain and rotors, giving it the compact footprint needed for shipboard stowage aboard carriers, amphibious assault ships and other air-capable vessels. Its cockpit is a glass cockpit using active matrix liquid crystal displays, and it shares a so-called common cockpit with the newer MH-60R, allowing a pilot to move between the two types with minimal retraining. The airframe, engines and avionics components were produced respectively by Sikorsky Aircraft Corporation, General Electric and IBM Corporation. A standard crew comprises one pilot, one copilot and up to two tactical aircrewmen, depending on the mission being flown.
Specific published performance figures for the MH-60S were not covered in detail, though as a direct derivative of the Seahawk family it inherits the twin-engine powerplant and folding rotor and tail system developed for shipboard operation, and shares the high degree of structural and systems commonality with the UH-60 Black Hawk that characterises the wider H-60 lineage.
The US Navy's H-60 family spans several designations, each with a distinct naval mission: the SH-60B and SH-60F for anti-submarine and anti-surface warfare, the HH-60H for combat search and rescue and special warfare support, the MH-60R as the modern anti-submarine and surface warfare type combining the roles of the SH-60B and SH-60F, and the MH-60S as the combat support variant built on the Black Hawk fuselage. The MH-60S itself traces back to a single prototype, the YCH-60S, which was converted to the MH-60S configuration in 2001 ahead of production.
The MH-60S is flown by the Navy's Helicopter Sea Combat (HSC) squadrons, which fly it on anti-submarine warfare, combat search and rescue, vertical replenishment and troop transport duties, operating from carriers, amphibious assault ships and other air-capable ships as well as shore bases. Its listed missions include anti-surface warfare, combat support, humanitarian and disaster relief, combat search and rescue, aeromedical evacuation, naval special warfare support and organic airborne mine countermeasures. It effectively absorbed the vertical replenishment role previously flown by the CH-46 Sea Knight and, alongside the MH-60R, has taken on duties formerly spread across the SH-60B, SH-60F and HH-60H as those earlier models were retired from Navy service by 2016. Beyond the US Navy, the type has been exported, including to Thailand following a 2011 delivery.
For a simmer, the MH-60S offers a distinctly different flavour from its sensor-laden MH-60R stablemate: its Black Hawk-derived cabin with sliding doors on both sides suits door-gunner, hoist and VERTREP operations, while its folding tail and rotor system are built around repeated shipboard landings and stowage. The glass cockpit, shared as a common design with the MH-60R, means the type reflects modern Navy helicopter avionics rather than the original analogue Seahawk instrumentation, and a flight crew of up to four, including tactical aircrewmen, underlines its role as a crew-served utility platform rather than a single-pilot aircraft.