Bell AH-1W SuperCobra
The Marines' twin-engine 'Whiskey Cobra' — T700 power and Hellfire, TOW and Sidewinder missiles · In service 1986 · USMC retired 2020
In 1981 Congress refused the Marine Corps money to buy the AH-64 Apache, so the Marines turned instead to a more powerful version of their twin-engine AH-1T. The AH-1W got two General Electric T700 engines and new fire-control systems for AGM-114 Hellfire anti-tank missiles and AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missiles, on top of TOW. Deliveries began in March 1986, and 179 were built new while 43 AH-1Ts were upgraded. From the side it is easy to tell from an Army AH-1F by its two engine exhausts.
The 'Whiskey' Cobra flew from amphibious assault ships for 34 years. Seventy-eight deployed for the 1991 Gulf War, and in June 1995 two AH-1Ws took part in the rescue of USAF pilot Capt. Scott O'Grady in Bosnia. The Marines retired the last AH-1Ws in October 2020 after 933,614 flight hours, replacing them with the four-bladed AH-1Z Viper that had grown out of an experimental 'four-bladed Whiskey'.
Taiwan ordered 42 AH-1Ws in 1992, delivered between 1993 and 1997, and later added 21 more for its army. Turkey bought ten in the early 1990s; in April 2022 the survivors were transferred to the Turkish Navy for service aboard the amphibious assault ship TCG Anadolu.
