Bell UH-1 Iroquois
The Bell UH-1 Iroquois, known to its crews as the Huey, is a turbine-powered utility helicopter built by Bell Helicopter Corporation for the United States Army. It came from a 1954 Army competition for a medical evacuation helicopter, first flew in 1956, and in Vietnam became the central aircraft of the Army's airmobile warfare, flying troop transport, medical evacuation, gunship and command missions. Production by Bell and its licensees passed 16,000 helicopters across the Huey family. The Army flew its last UH-1 in 2016; Hueys remain at work with other operators and preserved in museums.
Why It Mattered
The UH-1 was the first turbine-powered helicopter to enter military service, reaching the U.S. Army in 1960. Built for medical evacuation and utility transport, it became the instrument of a new kind of warfare, lifting infantry into battle under the Army's airmobile concept. In Vietnam, where it flew troop transport, medevac, gunship and command missions, the Smithsonian calls it an indelible symbol of the conflict. More than 16,000 helicopters of the Huey family came from Bell and its licensees, and Hueys have served in every branch of the American military and in 34 other nations.
Design Notes
The UH-1 began as Bell's Model 204, the company's entry in the Army's 1954 design competition for a new medical evacuation helicopter. Its defining choice was power: Bell and Lycoming developed the XT-53 turbine to Bell's specifications, and compared with the piston engines of the day, the turbine weighed less, ran more smoothly, needed less upkeep and proved far more dependable. The cabin was arranged around the mission the type was conceived for, carrying stretchers inside the aircraft. The first production model was designated HU-1A, hence the nickname "Huey", and officially christened Iroquois; when the designation system changed in 1962 it became the UH-1, but the nickname remained. Combat lessons drove the design to grow: the UH-1D entered service in 1965 with a wider cabin, a higher gross weight and more power, and the last major variant, the UH-1H of 1967, had a 1,400-horsepower engine, which let it haul 4,000 pounds of troops or freight up to 285 miles.
Operational History
The prototype, designated XH-40 by the Army, first flew in October 1956, and production followed in September 1958, starting with an initial batch of 182 Model 204s. The UH-1 entered military service in 1960, the first turbine-powered helicopter to do so. The first Hueys to reach Vietnam were medevac aircraft, arriving in April 1962; the first armed Hueys followed in October, their main role escorting the transport helicopters. The Army used the type to test airmobility, creating the 11th Air Assault Division after trials showed infantry could be moved around the battlefield by helicopter rather than by truck. In action, unarmed troop carriers nicknamed "slicks" inserted infantry deep in enemy territory, gunships escorted the transports with machine guns, rockets and grenade launchers, and smoke-laying Hueys screened the landing zones. The Huey's share peaked in March 1970, when two thirds of the more than 3,900 helicopters the U.S. military operated in Vietnam were Hueys. Medevac helicopters transported nearly 900,000 people in Vietnam, and the Huey airlifted ninety percent of the Army's combat casualties directly to medical facilities. In Vietnam the type's numbers passed 5,000 aircraft, and enemy fire accounted for some 2,500 of them lost. After Vietnam the Huey saw combat again during the invasion of Grenada, and flew in a limited role as a medevac platform during the Gulf War.
Afterlife
The UH-1H, the most-built of all helicopter subtypes, remained in production until 1982, when more than 5,500 had been built. Foreign demand was also met by licensed production, after Bell sold production rights in Italy, Germany, Taiwan and Japan. In U.S. Army service the end came gradually: most units replaced the Huey with the UH-60, and by 2006 almost all had left the inventory. The last UH-1 the Army operated made its final flight on 15 December 2016, and was then transferred to the Louisiana State Police to continue serving the public. Other Hueys survive in museums, among them the National Air and Space Museum's UH-1H, which compiled a distinguished combat record across four tours in Vietnam from 1966 to 1970 and is now on display at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. By the Smithsonian's accounting, those figures make the Huey the second most-produced American military aircraft ever, behind only the Consolidated B-24 Liberator.