The Future Transport Rotorcraft (FTR) is envisioned as the next generation heavy cargo rotorcraft capable of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) on unprepared surfaces. The FTR will provide true heavy lift and vertical envelopment capabilities for the Objective Force, well beyond the capabilities of the current CH-47 Chinook and CH-53 Super Stallion helicopters. The latest service-life extended versions of these aircraft will begin to reach the end of their planned useful life about 2020-2025, necessitating the need to develop the FTR with deliveries beginning by 2020. A joint service acquisition program with active participation by the Army (lead), Navy, Marine Corps and Special Operations Command, is desirable and more affordable. There is also potential application for the Air Force, Coast Guard and foreign militaries. The mission of the FTR will be to transport weapons, ammunition, equipment, troops and other cargo in general support of combat units across the operational spectrum. The FTR is a critical element of the Army Transformation process, providing the vertical envelopment capability for the Future Combat Systems (FCS). It provides the CINCs intra-theater, operational, tactical, and logistics mobility on the battlefield, and supports littoral, combat support, dominant maneuver, air assault, and Stability and Support Operations. The intent is for the FTR to compliment other logistical systems, both strategic and tactical.

Although it will have a strategic deployment capability up to 2,100 nautical miles, it is primarily a tactical rotorcraft with a combat radius of 500-1000 km. The FTR will be designed to carry a 10 to 20 ton internal combat payloads or outsized external loads over that combat radius in high and hot conditions. It will carry loads up to the size of fully load 22.4 ton MILVANs and ISO containers over shorter distances in gap/barrier crossing, logistics distribution and re-supply, recovery, and logistics-over-the-shore operations. This will require significant improvements in specific fuel consumption, power-to-weight ratios, composite structural weight, manufacturing processes and reparability, aerodynamic efficiencies, and life cycle costs.

To achieve these capabilities, the FTR will take advantage of advances in turbine engines, transmissions, rotor systems and flight controls, advanced structures and manufacturing processes, active and passive countermeasures, open architecture avionics and electronics, cargo handling systems, and advanced prognostics and diagnostics being developed under the Army and DoD Aviation Science and Technology program. Products from such programs as the Joint Turbine Engine Gas Generator, Variable Geometry Advanced Rotor Demonstration, Rotorcraft Drive System for the 21^st Century, Survivable and Reparable Airframe Program, Full Spectrum Threat Protection, Rotorcraft Open Systems Avionics, and Joint Advanced Helicopter Usage and Monitoring Systems will be integrated and demonstrated during a Program Definition and Risk Reduction program in FY 2008-2011, followed by Engineering and Manufacturing Development in FY 2012-2017.