Sanctions Help Iran Earn Self-Reliance in Helicopter Overhauling

“Overhaul of helicopters has become a routine and easy job for the Army’s Aviation experts and we do not have any problem in overhauling the Army’s helicopters,” General Qorbani said on Tuesday.

He also said that the Army’s Aviation experts are seriously working on the production of spare parts, and said, “At present, we can supply some of these parts to other units and even the friendly states.”

Iran’s military, including its air force and aviation units and aircraft, have been under tight sanctions since the onset of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Faced with pressures and an 8-year-long war, the Iranian army was forced to learn how to repair the then most advanced aircraft supplied to Iran by the US before the revolution.

Decades later, Iran is now not only repairing and overhauling various military planes and helicopters, but also manufacturing parts and even helicopters and two fighter jets.

In recent years, Iran has made great achievements in the defense sector and gained self-sufficiency in manufacturing essential military hardware and defense systems.

Yet, Iranian officials have always stressed that the country’s military and arms programs serve defensive purposes and should not be perceived as a threat to any other country.

In a relevant development in June, Iranian experts overhauled an F-27 military plane at an airbase in Tehran province.

Iran’s Air Force experts and engineers overhauled the warplane after 25,000 man-hours of labor at martyr Lashkari base in Tehran.

The warplane joined the Air Force on Saturday morning after training flights and passing the final tests.

Also, in 2016, the Iranian Air Force announced that its experts at Shahid Lashkari airbase had managed to overhaul an F-4 fighter jet.

The overhauling operations of the fighter jet took 18,000 man/hours of work. The F-4 aircraft joined the Air Force fleet after making its maiden flight in Tehran.

The aircraft is back to service after it was grounded for four years.