Aloula Aviation, a brand name of Mukamalah Aviation company, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Saudi Arabian oil and gas company Aramco, has achieved a major milestone with its AW139 intermediate twin engine helicopter fleet, by notching up 300,000 flight hours.

Khalid Alnatour, Aloula Aviation CEO, says: “Aloula Aviation is proud to be one of the first helicopter operators in the MENA region to achieve this significant milestone. It is hard to imagine this success without our strong partnership with Leonardo.”

Vittorio Della Bella, Leonardo Helicopters SVP customer support and training, adds: “We congratulate our partner Aloula Aviation for this amazing operational milestone. This has been set thanks to a unique combination of outstanding professional skills and expertise in top-class helicopter services at Aloula and the unmatched capabilities and technologies embedded into our AW139. We're glad to be part of their success delivering critical support to the energy industry and the national community, and we're committed to sustaining Aloula to reach greater and greater operational goals with its AW139s in the future.”

Aloula Aviation is one of the largest operators of Leonardo Helicopters in the Middle East. It has been operating AW139s since 2008 and AW109 light twins since 2006, mainly to perform offshore transport missions in Saudi Arabia in support of the oil and gas industry. Today's Aloula AW139 fleet consists of 27 units, and additional AW139s will be added this year. The AW139's outstanding hot and high performance, cabin space and flight/navigation technology have proved to make it ideally suited for Aloula's operational needs.

With nearly 1,500 units ordered by more than 300 customers from around 90 nations and over 4.5 million flight hours logged to date since its certification in 2004, the AW139 has also proven extremely successful for rescue and emergency missions. The AW139 delivers outstanding capabilities, technology and safety to meet stringent requirements from operators for tasks in harsh conditions to maximise effectiveness. This type features state-of-the-art avionics with advanced navigation and collision avoidance systems to enhance situational awareness and reduce pilots' workload; unmatched speed, power margins and overall performance; the widest cabin in its category, featuring high modularity for rapid reconfiguration; a unique more than 60 minute run-dry capable main gear box for enhanced reliability and safety; and up to 1,000 certified kits.

Mukamalah Aviation Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Aramco, operating under the brand name Aloula Aviation, is the first civil aviation company in Saudi Arabia and the second in the Middle East. It traces its origins to 1934, when the first aircraft was introduced by Aramco to support oil exploration operations in the Kingdom's vast deserts. From its headquarters in Dammam, Saudi Arabia, Aloula operates 55 aircraft of different types. Aloula maintains its vast fleet in hangars across a number of key locations. In addition to operating and maintaining these aircraft, Aloula regularly serves different airports throughout Saudi Arabia, a number of which Aloula fully manages, serves and operates, and more than 300 helipads, both on and offshore.