German gyrocopter manufacturer AutoGyro GmbH has delivered another five gyrocopters to the Benin government for law enforcement and other duties.
On 10 October the company said it had handed over three Cavalon Sentinel and two Calidus Sentinels fully equipped with a unique package of law enforcement systems, including provision for infrared and high-res cameras.
The first two of 12 Cavalon Sentinel gyrocopters were delivered in July this year, with the two (TY-50L and TY-51L) taking part in Benin’s independence day celebrations on 1 August.
The first batch of aircraft are deployed in Cotonou, where they carry out border monitoring and aerial surveillance in rural and urban areas. AutoGyro also provided a turn-key package of pilot training, with the first four Beninese pilots already flying the aircraft for months. The training programme extends into 2025 to cope with the number of pilots and skills required, including night and mountain operations.
Gerald Speich, CEO of AutoGyro GmbH, said the Cavalon and Calidus Sentinels are solid, reliable, and well proven aircraft platforms fitted with the latest avionics, communications and surveillance technologies. The company said that gyrocopters are inherently safe, with a broad speed range, making them an excellent observation platform perfect for border or highway patrols or wildfire spotting.
The Cavalon Sentinel is a side-by-side seat model while the Calidus Sentinel is AutoGyro’s tandem seat model. They are powered by the Rotax 916 iS engine, giving a maximum speed up to 225 km/h and range of four hours or 600 km.
Customer-defined equipment includes a high-res day-, night- and infrared camera system with real-time data downlink to mission control as well as multiple radios for different communication systems.
At the same time as the Beninese delivery, AutoGyro handed over another three Cavalon Sentinels to its Turkish partner SkyOlympos, for camera fitment and deployment with the Jandarma (Turkey’s national gendarmerie force). “The Jandarma already has huge success with this cost-effective policing solution, providing an excellent real-world use case by a major police service. Turkish Jandarma is very proud of their Sentinels and displayed them recently in the official Ceremony of Commissioning of their 7204 new vehicles. Because of this success, AutoGyro products are now part of the NATO parts catalogue, available to all NATO services,” the company said.
AutoGyro commenced its Made-in-Germany production in 2003 and since then has delivered more than 3 200 aircraft across the globe. The company has a sales and service network in over 40 countries.
