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Pentagon’s fleet of V-22 Ospreys—comprising Air Force CV-22s and Marine Corps MV-22s—has surpassed 100,000 flight hours. An MV-22 operating in Helmand province, Afghanistan, arrived at the milestone for the fleet last month, announced the tiltrotor aircraft’s manufacturing team, Bell-Boeing, Tuesday. “At 100,000 flight hours, safety, survivability, and mission efficacy have become hallmarks of the operational fleet,” said Mitch Snyder, Bell-Boeing’s deputy V-22 program director. The V-22s amassed these hours in combat, humanitarian, training, and test and evaluation missions on land and at sea, according to Bell-Boeing. They accrued almost half of the hours in the last two years. Air Force Special Operations Command CV-22s and marine MV-22s have participated in 14 combat and humanitarian deployments since the platforms began flying operationally in 2007. More than 130 Ospreys operate today. CV-22s first deployed overseas in October 2008.
The U.K. and the U.S. will continue to enjoy access to the ports, airfield, and workshops at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean for at least another century, under a deal inked between the U.K. and Mauritius May 22.