interview possibly reveils the successful completion of china's Z10 attack helo

just got this from china.com

http://military.china.com/zh_cn/news/568/20031124/11575556.html

the article roughly translates as:

“china.net: the newest edition of the ‘chinese youth’ magazine published an atricle by huang ai mei, which described a recent interview with china’s helicopter expert wu xi ming. the article states that wu has participated in almost every indiginous chinese helicopter project, and is currently the chief designer of the ‘chinese helicopter design research instatute’.

the article reveald that since 1998, wu has been the first deputy designer of a ‘major/important type’.

the ‘major type’ ‘s development was the result of a major strategic decision based on the needs of military modernsation. the designing process has been one of creatation, the body design and configuration and key systems presented difficult challenges; the technologies and techniques used were new; and the development cycle short. with the successful development of this type, china’s helicopter design capablities have been improved by about 20 year.

the type conducted ground tests is may 2002 and first flew in april 2003.

the article stated that the successful completion of this project has created many ‘miricles’: 1, the design capablities of helicopters was improved from the 70s to the 90s, and is the fastest improved in chinese aviation history; 2, the technologies used in th new type has reached world leading standards, and can be ranked fifth amoung similar types that are either in service or development world wide, and third amoung types currently operational; from the initional planning to the designing , from design to first flight, the type only used half the time of other foreign types.”

although the Z10 attack helo was not specifically named, the descriptions seem to match no other helo project currently undertaken by china.

both the ‘chinese youth’ and china.com are state owned, well established news outlets, so i would rank the credibility of this report to be very high.

with the successful compltion of the project and this unusually quick ‘coming out’, purhaps we may at last, be treated to some ‘leaked’ photos of this mysterious type sometime soon.:D chinese military fans, keep ur eyes pealed. 🙂

comments and related stories welcome, flamers are NOT.