Armed Services: Helicopters

Daniel Kawczynski
To ask the Secretary of State for Defence how many helicopters belonging to each of the armed services are in (a) the United Kingdom, (b) Afghanistan and (c) each other location.

Bill Rammell
The total number of Army, Royal Air Force (RAF) and Royal Navy helicopters based in the UK (as at 31 October 2009) is shown in the following table.

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|Service|Total number of UK-based helicopters|
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|Army   |182                                 |
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|RAF    |167                                 |
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|Navy   |128                                 |
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There are a further 24 helicopters permanently based in Germany, Canada, Belize, Brunei and Oman.

A proportion of the UK-based Army, Navy and Royal Air Force helicopter fleets are currently deployed on expeditionary operations. We do not disclose the exact number of aircraft deployed on operations as to do so would, or would be likely to, prejudice the capability, effectiveness and security of these forces.