So, will any of these new soldiers get to take a ride in that mystery helicopter when they take up patrols in far flung border outposts like Rio Blanco? That's usually a grueling 5 day trek through deep jungles with a 70 pound backpack - but with a helicopter, it can just be a 30 minute ride.
While this Helicopter is still a piece of evidence in a trans-border mystery occurrence of an illicit nature - the fact is the helicopter is needed, the BDF has someone who can apparently fly it, and it is parked at Force Headquarters tonight. But, that's getting ahead of ourselves. The fact is the BDF is already waiting on 2 helicopters that the BDF will acquire through legitimate means, and those will be coming from the Taiwanese Government.
Right now that's all the BDF commander is looking forward to. Here's what he told us:
Brig. Gen. David Jones, Commander, Belize Defence Force
"The 2 helicopters that are expected to come to us from Taiwan, we expect them some time by the end of this year. Before the end of the year we are going to have those two helicopters in the country. we had a team from Taiwan who came in to do the site visit, after that they looked at the facilities we've got and planned to bring the 2 helicopters in, assemble them and fly them around. Subsequently, we are trying to get a different team to come in, to start training our pilots to fly that particular platform. Because our pilots have been trained to fly the Bell, which is the similar helicopter as the flu in. But there needs to be some sort of conversion for them to fly a different platform. So we expect those by the end of the year where they will be operational."
To make use of these two helicopters, the BDF pilots will have to go through specialized training, since these Taiwanese ones are of a different type of flight platform.
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