08.03.2018.
Plant “Moma Stanojlović” soon to Become a Regional Centre for Maintenance of Airbus Helicopters
- Plant “Moma Stanojlović” will be a regional centre for maintenance of “Airbus” helicopters – stated Minister of Defence AleksandarVulin following today’s meeting with Cesar Sanchez Lopez, Vice President of the “Airbus” company for South Eastern Europe and Israel.
- We are very pleased with our cooperation and, when it comes to procurement of helicopters H145m, everything is going as planned and we expect that we will have received two helicopters by the end of the year – one for the Ministry of Defence and the other for the Ministry of Internal Affairs – Minister Vulin said and added that it was particularly important that the cooperation with the renowned company was raised to a higher level.Plant “Moma Stanojlović” will in the future have capacities and opportunity to become a regional centre for maintenance of the Airbus helicopters and for maintenance of our “Gazelles” and it will be capable of significantly developing its capacities. This means mastering new technologies and knowledge, employing people and our appearance on third markets. Thus, the Plant can truly say that it will have a secured future and that is something that is the most important for us, because you can buy helicopters, and planes, but you can master technology and learn how to maintain them, how to operate them and earn from it, you can do all of that just in this way and that is why it is of great interest for us – Minister of Defence AleksandarVulin said.
He reminded that the Ministry of Defence had ordered six helicopters while the Ministry of Interior had ordered three.
- We will have four combat helicopters and two are going to be used for search and rescue. They will all be equipped with the state-of-the-art technology, and we have purchased an excellent attack system and they will be equipped with a part of our armament. We are currently working and arranging with German engineers how to mount certain types of our armaments, for example machine gun gondola 12,7 and how to mount certain 80mm guided missiles launchers – Minister Vulin said.
Nenad Miloradović, Acting Assistant Minister for Material Resources pointed out that one of the serious benefits for Serbia in this endeavour was the technological collaboration that we had with the “Airbus”.- They are one of the two largest air industry companies of the world and the technologies that they possess are at the highest level and that is indeed a great thing for Serbian defence industry and generally for Serbian defence technologies – to be included in the list of suppliers and owners of such kind of technology, and be able to work and produce parts and components and be part of the technological support of that system – said Miloradović and added that the “package” was intensively being realised, and that concurrently with the production of the helicopters, certain preparations were being conducted in the Plant “Moma Stanojlović”.
He said that the investments that had been allocated by the Serbian Government the previous year to raise the capacities of “Moma Stanojlović” at required level, were heading in that direction.
- That is something that is going to be a great thing not only for “Moma Stanojlović” but for the air industry of Serbia, since the technologies that are being introduced will have a wide application, and after certifications, the Plant is going to be a licensed centre for the overhaul of “gazelle” helicopters, and that is pretty large fleet flying all over the world – said the Acting Assistant Minister and added that it might be even more significant that “Moma Stanojlović” would be certified to produce parts for the Airbus’s programme.
The meeting with the high representative of the “Airbus” group was also attended by AF and AD Commander Major General Ranko Živak and Head of Defence Technologies Department Major General Bojan Zrnić.
