The Soviet/Russian Mil Mi-26 “Halo”, the world’s largest mass-produced helicopter, is also among the most retired/abandoned of all still-in production examples on the market, as the notoriously short-lived main rotor blades, requiring total replacement after just 500 flight hours, makes maintenance prohibitively expensive and complicated, leading many users to abandon the type once other issues start to pile up.
Pictured are three operators who eventually abandoned their examples: Perú, bought to replace their Mi-6 fleet and barely used for a decade, Venezuela, bought in 2008 and last seen flying in 2017 (officially they’re still in service), and Mexico, which bought 2 units in 1999, one crashed in 2001, and the other stopped flying around 2004 and was officially retired in 2019.
