South-East Asia’s first helicopter flight using SAF takes off

Bell’s next generation five-seater helicopter, the Bell 505, fuelled with Neste MY Sustainable Aviation Fuel™ (SAF) took off in Singapore for a demonstration flight.
This is the first helicopter flight fuelled with SAF in Southeast Asia.
This milestone at Seletar airport was achieved by cooperation between Bell, Safran Helicopter Engines and Neste, with Jet Aviation and Shell Aviation enabling the blended SAF to be uplifted through their facilities.
“Bell has been in Southeast Asia for more than 40 years and we are proud to operate the first SAF helicopter flight here on our Bell 505,” said Jacinto Monge, managing director, Asia Pacific, Bell.
“The flight demonstrates our commitment to incorporating SAF into our customer demonstration aircraft globally, supporting Textron’s Achieve 2025 Sustainable Footprint goal for 20% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.”
“We strongly believe in SAF, as it contributes to significantly reducing CO2 emissions. As all our helicopter engines, the Arrius 2R, is already certified to operate on up to 50% SAF, and we are fully ready to assist all Bell 505 operators worldwide in their transition from conventional fossil fuels to SAF. With our products, we are proud to play an active role in the development of decarbonisation initiatives in Asia Pacific” says Valerie Patuel, managing director of Safran Helicopter Engines Asia, CEO and country general delegate of Safran Singapore.
Sami Jauhiainen, vice president APAC, Renewable Aviation at Neste, said: “The ambitious emissions reduction goals of the aviation industry can only be achieved through wide-scale adoption and use of sustainable aviation fuel and cooperation across the stakeholders in the aviation ecosystem. With today’s demo flight, we showcase that SAF can safely and easily be used also for helicopter operations.”