Airwolf
The Curious Life Cycle Of A Most Extraordinary Helicopter
The Bell 222 used by the hospital where I first honed my
craft as a physician was one of these extraordinary Bell 222s.
Photo by Pete Markham.
After eight years of flying military helicopters, I left the Army and went to medical school. These days, all sizable hospitals in the United States maintain a helicopter. Weather permitting, these airborne ambulances can transport patients in extremis much more quickly than a ground-based truck might. The Level 1 trauma center where I learned my trade had an extra-special cool one.
Our air ambulance was a simply magnificent Bell 222. The 222 was large-ish as medevac helicopters went, but it sure cut a sexy streak in the sky. In addition to being sleek and shark-like, the 222 used the same rotor system as did the Cobras I flew back in the Army. One of my med school buddies once asked me if I thought I could fly our medevac bird. After a little cerebration, I said that we could indeed likely fly that thing once, but then somebody would be waiting for us when we landed.
Truth be known, we did not hold the hospital helicopter in high regard. In fact, we called it the Rotating Crap Magnet. The helipad was on the roof. The distinctive sound of that big Bell 222 roaring in at oh dark thirty in the morning never did bode well. Not only did it mean some poor slob was just desperately sick or grievously injured, but it also meant no sleep that night for those us on the receiving end.
I wasn’t the only person smitten with our svelte Bell 222 medevac aircraft, however. Back in 1984, TV producer Donald Bellisario thought the 222 looked pretty sharp as well. That’s why he chose it to be the science fiction gunship in his exciting new TV series “Airwolf.”
The Bell 222 is one of the sexiest-looking helicopters ever built.
Small Screen 1980s Awesome
Any American manchild of a certain age is familiar with “Airwolf.” The outlandish premise has a secret government agency developing a high-tech supersonic attack helicopter capable of disappearing on radar and sporting a wide array of guns and missiles, some of which actually included small nuclear warheads. During a secret demonstration, a lunatic test pilot steals the aircraft, destroys the test facility and blasts off to sell his services to the Libyans.
The enigmatic, eye-patched intelligence chief who lost the aircraft goes by the code name Archangel. He recruits a brooding veteran test pilot named Stringfellow Hawke, played by Jan-Michael Vincent, to go to Libya and steal the aircraft back. Lots of stuff happens, of course, but once Hawke returns with the aircraft, he decides to keep it for himself. He promises to use it only for good and to return it when the U.S. government liberates his brother, an MIA POW purportedly still held in North Vietnam.
There followed a full four seasons of aerial action wherein Hawke and Airwolf blasted off each week to vanquish evil or some such. Forget for a moment that it is literally physically impossible to make a rotary-wing aircraft travel faster than sound and that it would take a veritable army of maintenance guys and zillions of dollars to keep such a beast in the air, much less fuel and arm it. Regardless, “Airwolf” was pure, unfiltered eye candy for a young high school grad who aspired to flight school himself.
This is a replica of the “Airwolf” helicopter that once resided in a
Tennessee museum before being perched as an art installation of
sorts atop a profoundly expensive California mansion. Photo by HrAtsuo
Details
The reason we are discussing “Airwolf” today is not the cheesy 1980s TV show per se. It is to explore the intriguing back story. The show’s lead, Jan-Michael Vincent, bore his own demons. You can spot them in his character if you look closely.
Vincent’s real-life grandfather was a bank robber, and his uncle was gunned down by law enforcement during the commission of a crime. For his part, the promising young actor had a long history of drug and alcohol abuse. He was also credibly accused of beating the women in his life. He was in and out of jail for offenses ranging from drunk driving to drugs to assault. He was married three times and badly injured in several automobile crashes, most of which involved alcohol. What should have been a fabulously successful career was badly curtailed by his off-screen behavior. Vincent died hard at age 71 in 2019.
The “Airwolf” helicopter was a Bell 222 with serial number 47085, owned by Jetcopters of Van Nuys, California. It was modified with fake missiles and retractable guns that fired propane for the show. The fourth season was shot on a shoestring, and to save money on production, predominantly stock helicopter footage from the previous three seasons was utilized.
Helicopters are expensive. Once the production of “Airwolf” wrapped, it was not practical to retire the aircraft. As a result, Bell 222 number 47085 was stripped of its Hollywood trappings and sold to an air ambulance company in Germany. On June 6, 1992, the “Airwolf” helicopter was flown into a thunderstorm on a life flight mission and destroyed, killing all three crewmembers. It seemed an ignominious ending for the world’s sexiest gunship.
