Aviation Contract Maintenance and its Effects on AH64 Unit Readiness

This study investigates the use of contractors to perform aviation maintenance on U.S. Army helicopters. It traces the development of the concept of privatization and the evolution of this process to the point where, currently, many duties formerly performed by soldiers are now the responsibility of contractors. The study analyzes why privatization became necessary in aviation maintenance and analyzes the effects of privatizing AH64 helicopter maintenance using the criteria of training, cost, readiness and deployability. The study concludes that the structure, training requirements and other nonproductive maintenance tasks required of today's soldiers forces commanders to hire contractors to maintain the readiness of the aviation fleet. The study also concludes that contractors are cost effective, when their cost and maintenance production is compared to soldiers. The readiness of aircraft is directly related to the number of maintenance man hours expended and it takes multiple soldiers to equal the production of one contractor. Based on the use of contractors to perform aviation maintenance in many recent contingency deployments, the deployability of contract maintenance is not a problem. The study further concludes that the benefits of contract aviation maintenance can be enhanced if the army formally recognizes the need for contracting and standardizes the program.

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