One seriously badass looking piece of equipment! I can't wait to see the armed gunship versions. There is enough room in the passenger compartment to put in dozens of Griffin glidebombs or Switchblade or BattleHawk UAVs at any rate, regardless of how many MGs, autocannons and rocketlaunchers they attach to external hardpoints.

Sikorsky makes great stuff....wondering why it took them almost 50 years to build what is essentially a slightly modified Cheyenne though. The AH-56 was able to achieve over 200 knots (230mph) in 1967 during it's first flight test.

Two sets of blades?
How ...noisy ...is ...it, compared to existing Huey and Osprey variations?
Faster and noisier is not an advantage!

Sikorsky S-97 Raider (together with a new design of Boeing Vertol and others) are trying to find new aerodynamic configurations, that can offer the same performance as complicated convertiplanes. They are welcome a S70 or AW139 400 km / h!

It's about time they got back to this design as so much better than a 1 blade in speed, lifting power, stability, etc. And it'll make less noise , not more as the rotors turn slower and less loaded/sq' of rotor making it more eff, longer range.

This looks somewhat like the AH-56 but it's really quite different. It has counter-rotating rigid rotors instead of a conventional hinged main rotor + a tail rotor. That translates to greater maneuverability, less vulnerability, and less maintenance. The AH-56 was ahead of it's time so the tech didn't exist yet to make it an affordable design. That's why the AH-64 doesn't have a propeller.

I am at a loss to understand why the aviation community ignores Carter Aviation Technologies gyro-copters. The major advantage for gyros is the absence of an extremely complex and expensive transmission: http://www.cartercopters.com/ From reading the technical data,it would appear Carter has made some important advances over earlier gyro technology.

great. This is without a doubt the future of helo's, it's better in every way.

What happens to the air in between both sets of blades?

I'm just starting to get comfortable with the V-22,is it already becoming obsolete?