A Helicopter tends to be much less efficient long-range vehicles than fixed-wing aircraft, therefore, the record for maximum range is far lower and there has been little effort to break it. The official record belongs to Robert Ferry who flew aboard a prototype YOH-6 Cayuse on a flight from California to Florida on 6 April 1966. The distance covered on the journey was 1,923.08 nm.

Currently, the longest-range helicopters in order are the Lockheed AH-56A Cheyenne, the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey, the Bell Agusta BA609, and the Sikorsky X2.

The Lockheed AH-56 Cheyenne, which has a range of 1,225 miles, was an attack helicopters designed by Lockheed for the US Army. It was developed by the Army’s Advanced Aerial Fire Support System (AAFSS) program as the service’s first dedicated attack helicopter. The Cheyenne was designed using a four-blade rigid-rotor system and configured as a compound helicopters with low-mounted wings and a tail-mounted thrusting propeller driven by a General Electric T64 turboshaft engine. The Cheyenne was intended to have a high-speed dash to provide armed escort for the Army’s transport helicopters, such as the Bell UH-1 Iroquois.

The Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey, which has a range of 2,230 miles, is a multi-mission, tiltrotor military aircraft with both vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capabilities. It was developed to feature the functionality of a traditional helicopters with the long-range, high-speed cruise performance of a turboprop aircraft. Its design came after the failure of Operation Eagle Claw during the Iran hostage crisis in 1980, which underscored the need for a new long-range, high-speed, vertical-takeoff aircraft for the Defense Department. In 1981, the Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program was begun and an agreement between Bell Helicopter and Boeing Helicopters to jointly produce the aircraft was reached. Since then, the Osprey has been deployed in transportation and medevac operations over Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Kuwait.

The Bell/Agusta BA609, which has a range of 863 miles, is a twin-engined tiltrotor VTOL aircraft similar to the Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey. It is capable of landing Bell helicopters while having a range and speed in excess of conventional rotorcraft. The AW609 is intended for the civil aviation market, in particular, business customers and offshore oil and gas companies.

The Sikorsky X2, which has a range of 808 miles, is an experimental high-speed compound helicopter with coaxial rotors designed by Sikorsky Aircraft. The X2 design includes expertise from other design projects. The S-69/XH-59A Advancing Blade Concept Demonstrator showed that high speed was possible with a coaxial helicopter with auxiliary propulsion (two jet engines), but that vibration and fuel consumption was unnecessary; the Cypher UAV expanded knowledge of coaxial flight control laws with a fly-by-wire aircraft; and the RAH-66 Comanche conveyed information regarding composite rotors and advanced transmission design.

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