A look back at the 50th European Rotorcraft Forum in Marseille

The French edition of the European Rotorcraft Forum was held at the Palais du Pharo in Marseille from September 10 to 12, 2024.

The forum is the first event in the European rotorcraft community's back-to-school calendar, bringing together industry, research institutes, academics, operators and regulators to discuss advances in aircraft research, development, design, manufacture, testing and operation.

The forum is held annually throughout Europe, in rotation in countries where the helicopter industry is present: United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy, Netherlands, Poland and Switzerland. It is organized by the various national aeronautical companies, and by the nation's representatives on the forum's international committee.

So the 3AF conference team, with the active support of the Provence group and the Helicopters and VTOL technical commission, took up the challenge of organizing the fiftieth edition of the forum. The previous French edition was held in Lille in 2016. This edition was organized in partnership with the French representatives on the forum's international steering committee, Arnaud Le Pape, Director of Helicopter Programs at ONERA, and Tomasz Krysinski, Director of Research at Airbus Helicopters. Airbus Helicopters, ONERA, Safran Helicopters Engines and several other companies supported the event: Capgemini Engineering, CT Engineering, Hutchinson and Nexteam Group.

360 participants from 20 different countries came to the Palais du Pharo to attend the presentation of the 159 papers selected by the scientific committee. This represents 35% more participants and 30% more papers than the usual edition.

The presence in Marseille of representatives from the British RAES, German DGLR and Italian AIDAA aeronautical learned societies enabled a fruitful exchange to take place with members of the 3AF commission. It was decided that, in conjunction with each annual forum, a meeting of the societies would be held to present and discuss their annual work.

Similarly, a meeting was held between the UAV Technical Committee and the Helicopters and VTOL Technical Committee to define the main areas of future technical cooperation.

The forum ended with a tour of the Marignane premises for around 110 ERF participants.