AgustaWestland, a Finmeccanica company, is pleased to announce that Geotech Aviation Ltd. has signed for one AW119Ke helicopter with options for four additional aircraft. The helicopter will be used for airborne geophysical surveys serving the mining, oil & gas and environmental industries. The AW119Ke will be based in Sudbury, Ontario. Built in Philadelphia, the first aircraft will be delivered in June 2011.

“We are pleased to have been selected by Geotech Aviation Ltd. to provide an AW119Ke as the newest addition to their operations. Geotech’s airborne geophysical survey equipment leads that market in both sophistication and efficiency, and the AW119Ke was the only aircraft that would allow Geotech to fully exploit their cutting edge technology to its competitive limit. This sale is significant to our presence in the Canadian airborne survey market”, said Lou Bartolotta, Executive Vice President Sales for North America.

David Lauzon of Geotech Aviation Ltd. said, “We selected the AW119Ke because it offers excellent value and improved performance. With this new platform, we will have expanded capability and will better serve our customers.”

The AW119 Koala enhanced is a spacious 8 seat single engine helicopter developed to strengthen safety and provide high productivity and performance at a competitive price. The large unobstructed cabin permits rapid re-configuration for a variety of emergency medical services missions. The high power margins deliver outstanding performance that makes the AW119Ke the most cost effective helicopter in its class. Around 190 helicopters have been ordered by over 90 customers in approximately 30 countries so far.

Geotech Aviation Ltd. is a sister company of Geotech Ltd. which provides full service rotary and fixed wing contract airborne geophysical surveys, data processing and data interpretation. At the present time Geotech Ltd. offers VTEM (helicopter-borne time-domain electromagnetic), ZTEM and AirMt (measure natural alternating magnetic fields in the audio-frequency range), magnetic, magnetic gradient and gamma-ray spectrometer surveys.