Civil Certification of a U.S. Government Procured Helicopter

Certification of an aircraft in the United States must proceed along one of two different and normally separate paths. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) governs one of those paths and is responsible for the certification of all civil aircraft. The Department of Defense (DOD) and its military branches govern the other path for all military and non-civil government aircraft. Most aircraft are developed for eventual certification under the rules and regulations of only one of these two organizations. Problems arise when it becomes necessary to seek approval from both. As a branch of the Department of Transportation (DOT), the United States Coast Guard is not a military organization. However, because of the similarity of their equipment and operations to those of the U.S. Navy, they often rely on military, as well as civil, specifications and requirements when purchasing equipment. Accordingly, the Coast Guard required that their new helicopter, the Aerospatiale HH-65A Dolphin, be qualified to both military and civil standards. This paper describes some of our experiences at Aerospatiale Helicopter Corporation (AHC) trying to walk both paths to certification.