Boeing has temporarily closed its helicopter and tiltrotor manufacturing sites in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as part of wider company and national efforts to help contain the coronavirus pandemic.
The Chinook (pictured), Osprey and Grey Wolf lines in Philadelphia have been closed for two weeks as Boeing implements coronavirus mitigation plans. (Boeing)
The shutdown of the Ridley Township facility affects the CH/MH-47 Chinook, V-22 Osprey, and MH-139A Grey Wolf production lines, and will last for two weeks from 3 April through to 20 April. Defence and commercial services work and engineering design activities are also performed at the site, and are similarly affected.
“During the suspension, Boeing will continue to monitor government guidance and actions on Covid-19 and associated impacts on company operations. The company will conduct additional deep cleaning activities at buildings across the site and establish rigorous criteria for return to work,” Boeing said in a statement.
In terms of the Chinook, Boeing has outstanding requests/orders for Greece, the Netherlands, Saudi Arabia, Spain, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The production line at Philadelphia is provisioned to turn out 60 helicopters annually (with 36 per year being the lowest rate presently economically viable).
For the V-22, Boeing builds the main fuselage at its Philadelphia plant, and has outstanding orders for the US Navy and Japan to complete. Also, the company recently opened up a new production line that will take the already in-service tiltrotors and upgrade them under the US Department of Defense’s Common Configuration Readiness And Modernization (CCRAM) programme. Over the next five years 129 V-22s will fly to the facility for capability enhancements to be fitted and obsolescence removed.
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