Kestrel

The Kestrel is a Venezuelan Army light attack helicopter featured in Mercenaries 2: World in Flames.

Overview
The Kestrel helicopter is a light attack helicopter used by the Venezuelan Army, it is rarely seen throughout the game. Because of its armement of two miniguns and fourteen rockets, it is more versatile and capable than the Kestrel Tank Hunter, Kestrel Attack and Toucan Transport. In a way, the Kestrel is also an upgraded but more expensive Combat Rogue helicopter because of its miniguns and extra transport capacity.

Like the Kestrel Tank Hunter, the Kestrel retains a passenger capacity of four despite being armed. This may be a glitch.

The Kestrel can be purchased from the Pirates at $125k. It can be seen landed near the air hangars at the Maracaibo Airport runway next to a manned Kestrel Attack in the Phone Tag contract for Universal Petroleum.

Tactics
This helicopter well equipped for infantry killing and short engagements against vehicles of any type. However, most buildings and heavy type 3-4 armor vehicles are likely going to survive after the helicopter as exhausted its ammunition.

The NPC crew in this helicopter are poorly defended from bullets and shrapnel; it is possible to shoot the crew out of their helicopter with any type of weapon.

The VZ disguise can make the Kestrel useful in infiltrating, observing and attacking VZ controlled areas.

Real life
The Kestrel and other similar variants are all based on the French built Aérospatiale Alouette IIIhelicopters.

Related pages

 * Kestrel Attack
 * Kestrel Tank Hunter
 * Toucan Transport
 * Combat Rogue