Fire Scout to Fly On Frigate

If you remember from our stories a couple months ago on the MQ-8B Fire Scout helo-drone, the Navy was in the middle of deciding what ship the UAV would be flown on as the service waits for the LCS to come into service. Since development of the Fire Scout has outpaced the troubled LCS, it made sense to put the drone to use now.

MQ-8B manufacturer Northrop Grumman has announced that the Navy decided to fly the drone aboard an FFG-7 Oliver Hazard Perry-class frigate and integrate it into the entire class while LCS progresses.

According to the current schedule, the Navy will conduct Technical Evaluation on the Fire Scout on FFG-7 in the fall 2008 and OpEval in the summer 2009. The Fire Scout will reach Initial Operating Capability soon after OpEval in 2009. The Navy will continue to support LCS Initial Operational Test and Evaluation (IOT&E) efforts in fiscal year 2011.

...a NorGrum release said...

Again, this marks a significant milestone for a program that was literally on life support a few years ago and proves that when you can get it right, things work out. We'll see how it works on the frigate, but clearly the move shows the Navy's got a lot of confidence in the platform.

Continues Northrop Grumman:

Fire Scout VTUAV restructuring is in the best interests of the Fleet and the U.S. Navy Fire Scout VTUAV program because it enables the Navy to continue supporting LCS integration and will provide a more mature system for LCS deployments.

Fire Scout is capable of landing on all aircapable ships, so integration efforts will focus on dynamic interface testing, supportability assessments and data management. The Navy and Northrop Grumman are working together to define and develop a roll-on/roll-off Fire Scout ship deployment package that will facilitate this effort.

Fire Scout is currently conducting envelope expansion, software validation, payload integration and data link testing at the Webster Field annex of Naval Station Patuxent River, Md.

-- Christian

More UAVs Taking Off

Two highly significant contracts that were awarded by the Department of Defense last week will have great impact on the rapidly increasing role of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) in the U.S. armed forces. The first, on 21 April, was for phase one of the Vulture program intended to provide an unmanned aircraft with an endurance of five years. The second contract, announced a day later, was to acquire the RQ-4N variant of the Global Hawk for the Navy's Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) program.

The Vulture program -- under the aegis of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) -- envisions a vehicle carrying a 1,000-pound payload drawing five kilowatts of power that is able to remain aloft for an uninterrupted period of at least five years while remaining in the required mission airspace 99 percent of the time.

The Vulture phase one contracts were awarded to Aurora Flight Sciences, Boeing, and Lockheed Martin. According to DARPA, the Vulture program will focus on developing innovative technologies and approaches for in-flight energy collection (e.g., from solar panels) or refueling in flight and ultra-reliable systems or systems that could be repaired in flight. Other technologies that will be developed include multi-junction photovoltaic cells, high specific energy fuel cells, extremely efficient propulsion systems, advanced structural designs.

In the second phase of Vulture the contractors will refine demonstrator designs, continue technology development, and conduct an uninterrupted three-month flight of a sub-scale demonstrator. Phase three will consist of a continuous 12-month flight of a full-scale demonstrator.

In some respects the Vulture will be a corollary to the Helios UAV program. That vehicle was a long, thin, flying wing intended to fly higher than any unmanned aircraft ever. It passed an altitude of 76,000 feet on its first solar-powered test flight on 14 July 2001. Operating from the Pacific Missile Range Facility on the island of Kauai, Hawaii, no problems were encountered during the 10-hour, 17-minute flight. A flight the following 13 August took the UAV to 96,863 feet.

The Helios crashed two years later. A 247-foot-long flying wing that measured only eight feet front to back, Helios was a $15 million aircraft controlled from the ground by pilots using desktop computers. Its 14 propellers were driven by small electric motors powered by solar cells built into the wing. Helios was built by a partnership of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and AeroVironment Inc. of Monrovia, California.

While the Venture's primary goal will be endurance rather than altitude, it will also be a high-flyer, able to provide unprecedented surveillance and other functions over a designated area.

In a less prosaic UAV effort, a year after proposals were received, the Navy has selected Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk for the BAMS program. The $1.16 billion cost-plus-award-fee contract will develop the RQ-4N variant for persistent maritime Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) data collection and dissemination.

The Global Hawk is the largest operational UAV ever produced, having a 116-ffot wingspan, a length of 44 feet, and weighing almost 26,000 pounds with a 2,000-pound internal payload. The UAV first flew in February 1998 and soon entered U.S. Air Force service. It continues in production.

In U.S. Navy service the RQ-4N variant will compliment the new P-8A Multi-Mission Maritime Aircraft (MMMA), which is planned to replace the long-serving Lockheed P-3 Orion. The BAMS/RQ-4N platform may be particularly useful in some of the electronic intelligence missions flown by the EP-3E aircraft as well as various one-of-a-kind Orion environmental and oceanographic research missions.

And, looking to the long term, the BAMS/RQ-4N, with its current endurance of almost 24 hours and large payload, may eventually perform other missions in direct support of the fleet, such as Airborne Early Warning (AEW).

These two UAV efforts -- the long-term Vulture and the near-term BAMS -- are further indications of the increasing significance of unmanned vehicles to U.S. military operations.

-- Norman Polmar

Robot Targets Men in Iraq

Yesterday afternoon we ran a story on Military.com about a U.S. drone strike that killed four Shiite "militants" in Basra.

An unmanned U.S. drone fired two Hellfire missiles at militants attacking Iraqi soldiers in a Shiite militia stronghold in the southern city of Basra on Wednesday, killing four of the gunmen, the military said.

The airstrike in Basra occurred about 1 a.m. after militiamen attacked an Iraqi army patrol with rocket-propelled grenades on the eastern side of the Hayaniyah district, the U.S. military said. A vehicle suspected of containing more weapons and ammunition also was destroyed.

To me this strike seemed interesting for it's "close air support" flavor. Up until only recently, the armed Predators and Reapers have been used primarly for strategic and infrastructure strikes. We all know about drones going after HVTs in a "surgical" hit, but this time it seems they were used to support Iraqi troops on the ground.

We also saw reports of drones being used in this way during last week's fighting in Sadr City.

Does this signal a paradigm shift in the use of combat drones? I'd be interested to know what the coordination for CAS is with this kind of asset -- what's the response time? Seems to me it's a good idea in a place where US assets are thinly distributed like Basra. And as the US withdraws more and more troops over the coming years, we could see a lot more of this kind of drone-kills-man scenario.

-- Christian

Boeing's New Helo-Drone

This article first appeared in Aviation Week and Space Technology.

Boeing is poised to attempt a brace of world record endurance flights with its A160T Hummingbird unmanned air vehicle after installing new safeguards to prevent a flight control system failure which led to the loss of a prototype last December.

The accident put a three-month hold on an already aggressive test and demonstration schedule earmarked for the A160T through the rest of 2008. Yet Boeing remains confident it can meet its schedules, as well as set records for rotary UAV payload and endurance that it claims others will find difficult to match.

The record attempt flights will include a hover out of ground effect at 15,000 ft. and an 18-20-hr. flight with a 300.-lb payload. Together they form the final milestones of the Phase 1 demonstration which began in August 2003. Supported by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), the tests are intended to prove that a purpose-built, clean-sheet large vertical takeoff and landing unmanned air system (VUAS) can truly go the distance compared to other rotary UAVs that are generally derived from existing manned helicopters.

"We think we've got something different here," says Boeing Advanced Systems' business development director, Grady Eakin. "The range, endurance and payload are unique for a rotary-wing UAV, and we think it can provide a variety of missions all at the same time. We've proved we can get there quickly, stay a long time and fly to places that commanders think are important," he adds.

Although the A160T is aimed squarely at standard UAV roles such as reconnaissance, surveillance, communications relay, resupply and target acquisition, Boeing says the broader capabilities of the turbine-powered helicopter make it capable of much more. One of the initial test vehicles has been mocked-up with stub wings to carry up to eight AGM-114 Hellfire air-to-ground missiles, while another has flown with an aerodynamically-shaped pod large enough to evacuate a wounded soldier or transport a small robotic vehicle.

With Northrop Grumman's MQ-8B Fire Scout already destined for major VUAS roles with the U.S. Navy and Army, Boeing is seeking new niche opportunities for the A160T beginning with the U.S. Special Operations Command (Socom). Initial operational evaluations of the MQ-8B, a modified Schweizer 333, are planned for 2008, while first flight of the Army's MQ-8B variant is slated for the end of 2010, with initial operating capability scheduled for 2014. Demonstrations are also planned to the Navy. Operational tests of the A160T could, by contrast, begin within the next year or so, says Boeing.

Part of the challenge, says Eakin, is making potential users aware of the A160T's capabilities. "There [are] a variety of military and government users that haven't thought yet about how far this has flown and what it can do for them. We've just recently talked to a couple of potential customers and they are surprised that we can carry a couple of payloads, and fly far away from their basing scheme," he adds.

The 35 ft.-long A160T is powered by a Pratt & Whitney Canada PW207D turboshaft driving a 36-ft.-dia., four-blade rotor. The blades, like the fuselage itself, are made from lightweight carbon fiber composites, while the streamlined fuselage shell is designed for both low drag and reduced radar cross-section.

"It's significantly larger than any other VTOL [UAV], but it is significantly lighter as well," says Eakin. "We have a fairly high fuel fraction of more than 50%, which is slightly higher than other UAVs and manned helicopters." Empty weight is 2,500 lb. and the helicopter carries 2,600 lb. of fuel in large tanks clustered around the center of gravity. The forward tank, mounted just ahead of the mostly internally housed rotor mast, occupies almost the whole depth of the fuselage, while a second large tank is sandwiched beneath the engine and transmission housing and the bay in the belly for the retractable gear. Maximum takeoff weight is 6,500 lb. while the largest payload carried to date is around 1,090 lb.

Read more on this story, French amphibious landing craft, an April Fools joke on defense contractors and the many facets of FCS from our friends at Aviation Week on Military.com.

-- Christian

Northrop Crafts Multimission N-UCAS

First of all folks, please excuse the delay in posting. I am on a trip this week and wasn't able to establish comms until today -- and Ward's off on a trip as well.

I'll be up and running throughout the week, but the frequency may be down a bit from before.

Here's a great piece of reporting from our friends at Aviation Week on a program I see as the future of Navy strike aviation. I got a few more tidbits from some sources at the Navy League confernece I'll add a little later on this subject, but chew this over first and we'll update soon.

This article first appeared in Aerospace Daily & Defense Report.

Northrop Grumman officials are promoting their unmanned strike aircraft being designed for the U.S. Navy as a "first-generation" unmanned combat aerial system (UCAS) with capabilities that include early missile defense intercepts.

The initial platform for a new strike fighter design is based on the company's X-47B, but Northrop researchers are actually assembling an internal system that could fit into a variety of airframes, according to Scott Winship, vice president and program manager of Navy UCAS. The aircraft would incorporate "marinized low observability" and air-to-air refueling as well as advanced sensors, targeting and weapons.

However, Winship contends that a mix of fifth-generation Lockheed Martin F-35s and Northrop's UCAS would be a far more powerful combination than Boeing Super Hornets teamed with the UCAS because of the F-35's ability to penetrate foreign air defenses in combination with the unmanned aircraft.

Boost phase

With surprising candor, Winship identified important new capabilities for the unmanned strike aircraft including boost-phase intercept (BPI) of enemy ballistic missiles soon after launch and the carriage of new, compact, directed-energy weapons. He said options will include both laser and high-power microwave (HPM) weapons. Lasers are seen as a key BPI weapon while HPM is critical to electronic attack.

The new design also will address the U.S. military's fading electronic-attack (EA) capability. The Air Force has failed to come up with a new EA capability for the near term, and by 2012, the Navy will retire its EA-6B Prowlers, which now provide that capability to the expeditionary air forces.

"The Navy is going to be out of the EA-6B business," says Capt. Steve Kochman, manager of the EA-6B program. "There are ways the [Air Force need] can be filled, [but] I'm not endorsing any of them." So, for now the program of record has the Navy stepping out of the Air Force mission and a replacement capability has not been approved. "Something will have to be worked out," he said.

Next-gen stealth

"Broadband, all-aspect stealth is next-generation," which is reflected in the cranked-kite, tailless X-47B design, Northrop's Winship said. "It is also sensors -- signals and electronic intelligence -- and directed energy." Conformal antenna arrays -- eight on the top side of the aircraft and eight below -- will also contribute to low observability and provide 360-degree coverage.

Advanced air-to-air missiles are being studied as part of the BPI mission as well as directed energy and rechargeable weapons that could be carried as palletized units sized for the weapons bays' 4,500-pound payload carrying capability. Alternative weapons bay doors would be fitted with apertures for the directed energy weapons.

Northrop designers are looking for an aircraft that can fly 50-100 hour missions and that can go into the toughest, so-called fourth zone of enemy air defenses.

Navy and Marine Corps electronic warfare requirements officials later described the mission as "stand-in [jamming, electronic attack or strike] within a surface-to-air missile's no escape zone."

-- Christian

...Fire Scout Cont'

And now for news on the Navy Fire Scout front.

This isn't something necessarily to shout from the rooftops, but it's significant nonetheless because of what we just wrote on the Army version.

The Navy, seeing its LCS program slipping into budget and programmatic limbo, has decided to keep it's Naval variant of the Fire Scout alive by assigning it to another type of ship while it waits for the LCS to come to life.

Officials weren't able to name the new ship, saying the Navy was still trying to decide. But it seems that the decision isn't hung up in technical factors so much as it is in scheduling ones.

One source told me it's more a question of when the next aviation-capable ship is available for testing and certification than anything else. And Fire Scout backers say the relatively simple design can be accommodated on any of the Navy's ships that can land a helicopter.

Officials said the decision should be announced within the next two weeks.

In other Fire Scout news, the company is building it's own Fire Scout test bed based on the MQ-8B design to evaluate new components. It'll be called Project Whitetail and first out of the gates is a sea scanning radar built by Telephonics.

The new radar will be used to try and prove the Fire Scout's utility as an anti-submarine platform and company officials say the Whitetail is key to attracting foreign partners who might have their own payloads to contribute to a national buy.

-- Christian

Fire Scout Mired in FCS Rumble

We're cruising the halls of Sea Air Space this week -- the Navy League's annual big time expo in Washington, DC -- and trolling around for news big and small. We'll post here often with little tidbits that might strike your fancy, so check back often to read the latest.

OK, back to business...

Went to a poorly-attended briefing today with the folks from Northrop Grumman on their MQ-8B Fire Scout rotor-wing UAV. Too bad, because they broke a little news there both on the Navy side of their program and on the Army version they're building for the Class IV UAV in the FCS program.

First of all, and many of you might already know this and, frankly, I haven't been as closely following this as I should have, but the Army chose not to send their Fire Scout copters to Iraq as a preliminary evaluation. We reported this might be happening last summer, but it dropped off our radar until now.

The plan was to field as many as eight Fire Scouts to Army forces in Iraq by 2008.

The NorGrum #2 official in charge of UAV systems gave one reason for the Army's decision to kank the deal. First of all the suppliers of the systems the MQ-8Bs were supposed to fly with over there weren't able to deliver on time.The Army wanted the forward deployed Fire Scouts to hunt for mine and IEDs and keep an ear open for enemy radio traffic. But no joy, the NorGrum exec said.

But I also heard whispers that the Army didn't want a successful Fire Scout deployment to upstage other FCS initiatives that are biting and scratching for funds. So much for the whole idea of spiraling out technologies from the program into the force when they're ready, huh? Now successful portions fall victim to budget politics.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

-- Christian

Remember Slipping the Surly Bonds? Forget It!

First off, happy new year, everybody. Here's hoping for a great 2008.

This morning's lead story at Military.com has some interesting facts and figures surrounding the military's use of drones in Iraq. Here's an excerpt:

The military's reliance on unmanned aircraft that can watch, hunt and sometimes kill insurgents has soared to more than 500,000 hours in the air, largely in Iraq, The Associated Press has learned.

And new Defense Department figures obtained by the AP show that the Air Force more than doubled its monthly use of drones between January and October, forcing it to take pilots out of the air and shift them to remote flying duty to meet part of the demand.

And, as several military officials state in the article, that demand is only going to go up, even as the surge winds down.

Now, understanding the utility and cost effectiveness of drones, I'm wondering what happens to the morale and career motivation of an Eagle driver who suddenly gets the nod to be Drone Boy. Imagine hanging out in the ready room, wearing your speed jeans and talking with your hands, when someone taps you on the shoulder and hands you a joy stick. No more strapping into an ejection seat. No more touching the face of God. Just a cinderblock building and a video display.

Lou Gossett, Jr. doesn't play Drone Boy . . .

Read the entire story here.

-- Ward

Scan Eagle From a DDG

Here's an interesting story we're running at Military.com today. The use of UAVs on an increasing number of Naval platforms is remarkable in its own right. But it seems to me also that as this continues, the size of the platform from which UAVs operate could get smaller and smaller.

Guided-missile destroyer USS Oscar Austin (DDG 79), completed a robust testing phase of the ScanEagle, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), Nov. 17, en route to the Central Command area of operations as part of the ongoing rotation to support Maritime Security Operations.

"ScanEagle is an incredible asset not only for this ship, but the Navy too," said Oscar Austin's Commanding Officer, Cmdr. Eric Weilenman. "It gives me great [subject awareness] on what's around the ship and allows me to keep my visit, board, search, and seizure teams aware of their environment because the UAV provides positive identification on vessels of interest, which allows me to pass accurate security information to my Sailors as they prepare to board."

While in flight, ScanEagle provides live, high-quality video that helps develop and maintain a Recognized Maritime Picture and further enhances Maritime Domain Awareness.

It seems to me that you could walk down this logical path to the Army's Future Combat Systems concept. As the launch and recovery methodologies get more deployable, it's not too much of a stretch to imagine tanks and APCs carrying their own UAVs to survey the road ahead and recover back to the tank.

Contractors operate the UAV while Navy intelligence specialists and flight deck crew work side-by-side with the civilians.

"ScanEagle is launched by a pneumatic wedge catapult launcher and flies off pre-programmed computerized files or operators (like myself) to initiate the mission," said Hamann.

"When retrieved, we use what is called a 'Skyhook' system, where the UAV catches a rope that is hanging from a 50-foot high pole," Hamann added.

The last ship that deployed with ScanEagle, USS Carter Hall (LSD 50), completed 19 missions and 933 flight hours.

The software and back-end technology are there, but maybe it's the bandwidth and launch/recovery phase that are still the sticking points (and money and complexity, ya ya ya...).

(Gouge: ED)

Photo from Boeing

-- Christian

Reaper Drops First Combat GBU

The highest-tech equipment used in probably the lowest-tech war...

From the USAF:

The MQ-9A Reaper demonstrated it's unique precision strike capability as a hunter-killer attack platform by dropping its first precision-guided bomb Nov. 7.

"The beauty of the MQ-9 Reaper is that we're able to synchronize and integrate unmanned aerial attack platforms over the skies of Afghanistan, allowing us to persistently and consistently track the enemy and ensure that we place the appropriate ordnance on target when required, and maintain that persistent presence after weapons release," said Lt. Gen. Gary North, U.S. Central Command Air Forces commander.

The Reaper, the Air Force's unmanned aerial attack vehicle, was operating over the Sangin region of Afghanistan on the hunt for enemy activity when the crew received a request for assistance from a joint terminal attack controller on the ground. Friendly forces were taking fire from enemy combatants. The JTAC provided targeting data to the pilot and sensor operator, who fly the aircraft remotely from Creech Air Force Base, Nev. The pilot released two GBU-12 500-pound laser-guided bombs, destroying the target and eliminating the enemy fighters.

The ability to carry bombs, in addition to AGM-114K Hellfire missiles, is just one of the features that set the Reaper apart from its smaller brother the MQ-1 Predator.

"The MQ-9 gives us an incredible addition to the arsenal," General North said. "It's larger, carries an increased payload and is able to fly longer, higher and faster. It's an incredible addition to our attack capability in the CENTAF force lay-down."

The Reaper has flown 49 combat sorties since it first began operating in Afghanistan Sept. 25. It completed its first combat strike Oct. 27, when it fired a Hellfire missile over Deh Rawod, Afghanistan, neutralizing enemy combatants.

I'm sorry, I just never tire of the idea that there's a JTAC on the ground, under fire, who calls in for CAS to a pilot in a trailer in Nevada, who sends a command to a robot plane buzzing overhead, which drops the bomb perfectly, which kills the enemy, which saves the JTAC and his unit.

For everyone who says China is surpassing a complacent and distracted US, all I have to do is point them to this kind of operation conducted in the most austere, uncontrolled laboratory in the world and think to myself that the US is pretty far out ahead when it comes to this kind of net-centric technology and capability.

-- Christian

Keen Eye Saves Soldiers

Extraordinarily keen observation by a British Royal Navy officer narrowly averted a potentially tragic friendly fire engagement using a Predator or Reaper UAV.

The UAV operator had been given clearance to engage the targets -- a group of 7-10 men -- in an operational theater. The men had been identified as hostile forces.
The navy officer, believed to be working as part of a joint US-UK UAV force operating from Creech AFB, Nevada, noticed that the men, while dressed in local attire, did not actually walk in the same manner.
This single observation led to the potential engagement being called off. The group were in fact special forces.

From our friends at Aviation Week.

-- Christian

The Drone Bomber Race...

...begins (well, among our allies, that is).

From a piece in the Malaysia Sun:

BAE Systems of the U.K is developing Britain's first unmanned fighter-bomber for the Ministry of Defence.

The Taranis project, forms part of the U.K's Unmanned Air Vehicle program and will cost the government 124 million pounds.

BAE Systems is working with military staff and scientists to develop and fly Taranis.

The jet will be designed with a bat-wing and will be able to think for itself, independently tracking and destroying enemy aircraft and targets.

But BAE has assured defence personnel that human authorisation will always be required before Taranis can use any of its weaponry.

Ground testing is expected to take place in early 2009, and the first flight trials are scheduled to take place in 2010. Taranis could be fully operational within 10 years.

I know, I know, this might be old news to some, but it's news to me. And I am curious to know from our international readers what the status of this project is right now. As you know, I'm a huge fan of combat drone development, and I want to make sure we have the latest on all efforts here.

Bring it!

-- Christian

Ford Engine Powers New Boeing UAV

Boeing's work on a high-altitude, long-endurance UAV has moved forward with a successful four-day test of a hydrogen-fuelled engine, including three days at a simulated altitude of 65,000 feet. Teammates include Aurora Flight Sciences, providing the high-altitude test facility at Manassas, VA, and - revealed for the first time - Ford Research and Advanced Engineering.

Ford has developed a multi-stage-turbocharged engine - based on the engine used in the Ford Fusion - for Boeing's UAV project. Boeing is looking at a military HALE with a seven-day-plus endurance and a 2,000-pound payload; Aurora is working on its single-engine Orion HALL (High Altitude Long Loiter) both as an engine test platform and as a research vehicle.

Using an automotive engine makes sense. In-service small aircraft engines are almost all air-cooled, which is a headache in the stratosphere, and are based on very old designs. Auto engines use more modern materials. Meanwhile, the ability of an internal combustion engine to operate at very high altitude, given sufficient turbo boost, has been proven in multiple programs, including Boeing's own groundbreaking Condor.
This article first appeared on Aviation Week’s Ares weblog. Read the rest of the story HERE.

-- Aviation Week

Boola Boola, Reaper

Anytime you can combine stealth and standoff and loiter and lethality in the same platform, you've got a significant winner. Kudos to the MQ-9 Reaper. Looking like a big brother` to the MQ-1 Predator, the MQ-9 has three times the speed of the MQ-1, with a 900hp turboprop engine in place of the Predator’s 119hp Rotax 914. Nice job, Zoomies!

Reaper scores insurgent kill in Afghanistan

Air Force Times Staff report
Posted : Monday Oct 29, 2007 18:59:06 EDT

The Air Force’s use of remote-controlled aircraft passed another milestone Saturday with the first air strike flown by an MQ-9 Reaper, the service’s newest unmanned plane.

According to Central Air Forces, an MQ-9 fired a Hellfire missile at Afghanistan insurgents in the Deh Rawood region of the mountainous Oruzgan province. The strike was “successful,” CentAF said.

Based at Kandahar Air Field, Reapers have been flying over Afghanistan since Sept. 25. Like the smaller MQ-1 Predator, pilots and sensor operators in Nevada use satellite links to guide the planes on attack and reconnaissance sorties. A second set of deployed aviators control the planes’ take offs and landings.

The Reaper can carry up to 3,000 pounds of weapons while the MQ-1 is limited to 500 pounds of munitions.

--Pinch Paisley

Raven Plys the Afghan Skies

Even the little drones get a chance to play (and maybe they won’t incur an NTSB investigation if they crash)...

From Military.com’s Warfighter’s Forum:

As winter approaches in the northeastern mountains of this rugged country, U.S. and Pakistani forces are making every attempt to learn the whereabouts of Taliban and al-Qaida fighters who jump back and forth across the border.

One tool helping the U.S. military is the Raven, a small, unmanned aerial vehicle that, with its multiple real-time cameras, offers a bird's-eye view of any movements on the ground within a three- to six-mile radius of where it is operated.

This lightweight, reconnaissance-only, remote-control "plane" can help save the lives of soldiers who, 10 or 20 years ago, might have had to provide on-site surveillance for platoons or patrols looking to assault a designated area.

"It takes soldiers off the front line," said Cpl. Erick Rodas, 21, who was selected to familiarize eight soldiers assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division and 173rd Airborne Brigade with the Raven.

"We have the capability to be where the enemy is, without sending men in first," the Houston native continued.

The "front line" in this unconventional war is constantly evolving, making the Raven particularly effective. It can tell whether Taliban rebels are on the other side of a mountain that the troops want to traverse, for example.

In that case, Air Force fighter jets might be called in to drop bombs or strafe the insurgents.

However, along with its Predator counterpart, it has drawbacks. The Raven can be seen, and the Predator can both be seen and heard. The Predator is bigger and the power to make it fly compromises its stealth.

In Iraq, insurgents and civilians have figured out the Predator, but it still proves to be effective, according to military officials. The Raven, which is smaller, cannot be heard except when it is closer to the ground, so it has a slight edge. But it does not have a weapons-delivery capability, unlike the Predator and coming Reaper.

Troops say the Raven is fairly easy to operate.

"It's fun and pretty straightforward," said Staff Sgt. Chris Ellis, 35, from Cincinnati. "But it can be a little tricky to operate when there are crosswinds."

He made the comments after having launched the craft on a successful training flight in Jalalabad. Ellis is a member of the 173rd Airborne's brigade support battalion.

The Raven weighs just less than 4½ pounds and can have a video-feed range of 1,000 feet in elevation.

It can be carried in a backpack and assembled in as little as five minutes, according to Rodas.

The Army is training more troops on the Raven so they can operate it regardless of their duty in a war zone.

"It's possible for just one person to operate it, but ideally, two people should do it," said Rodas, also a member of the brigade support battalion.

A remote-control panel operates the craft from the ground, while the operator watches a screen to monitor the Raven's live video feed.

-- Christian

Brave New World Still Human . . .

The NTSB has found "pilot error" as the main causal factor behind a Predator crash back in April 2006 according to The Washington Post:

The pilot's computer console locked up, investigators said. He started to transfer control to a backup console used by Customs agents to operate the drone's cameras but did not follow a checklist that required him to make sure the engine controls on the second console matched the ones he had been using.

Because the second console's controls were in the fuel shut-off position, investigators said, the Predator-B's engine quit when control was switched.

The pilot, who did not understand why his plane kept descending, turned off ground communication with the drone to trigger its automatic emergency responses, according to investigators. Under such conditions, the plane should have climbed to 15,000 feet and circled above a designated spot until communication was reestablished. But without engine power, the plane crashed.

The pilot told investigators that he didn't follow the checklist because he was in a hurry, said Pam Sullivan, an NTSB investigator.

Under Customs guidelines, the pilot did not have enough hours on the Predator-B to fly the plane without an instructor in the room, and the instructor was in another building, Sullivan said.

Ah, sweet solace. It does an aging aviator's heart good to see the more things change, the more they stay the same.

-- Ward

Air Force Killer Drone in The Stan

Last month we reported that the Army had chalked up its first kill with an aerial drone in Iraq. Now the Air Force is jumping into the fray with its MQ-9 Reaper in Afghanistan.

According to the service, the Reaper was first officially deployed to Afghanistan on Sept. 25 and has flown a dozen missions since then. The Reaper has nine times the range of the armed MQ-1 Predator and flies at twice the altitude.

Click HERE to watch an Air Force video of the Reaper in action.

But it looks like the Air Force has some catching up to do with its new robot killer: so far the service is reporting zero kills. Hmmm, the Army’s one up on their Air Force brethren when it comes to drone kills? At least publicly, that is...

(Gouge: NC)

-- Christian

AF Brass Bristle at Drone Decision

The Pentagon's number two official tried to throw cold water on this cat fight, but it seems that the fur is still flying.

On Sept. 13, Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England forwarded a memorandum to the service chiefs and top Pentagon officials rejecting a recommendation that the Air Force be the central authority for high and medium-altitude unmanned aerial vehicles.

Air Force brass figured since they do most of the flying these days, the atmosphere - and most everything in it - should be their domain.

But over the last several years the Army has expanded its use of UAVs - particularly medium altitude ones - and they were dead-set against letting their sister service tear control of those assets out of their hands.

What England did was to shift oversight responsibility to the Pentagon, convening a task force that will examine UAV issues and map out a coherent strategy for all the services to develop drone needs, missions and systems, so resources aren't wasted and there's better coordination.

But that doesn't sit well with some top Air Force commanders who see this as more of the same.

"A committee has often been described as a cul-de-sac down which good ideas are lured and then quietly strangled," said Gen. Ronald Keys, commander of Air Combat Command, during a panel discussion with top Air Force generals in Washington.

"My thought is let's put somebody in charge of this, let's hold him accountable, and let's see if he can't sort this out," he said.

The Air Force's top general was more diplomatic in his criticism, arguing that England's decision is still new and a lot could come of the task force developing the UAV roadmap.

"There has to be a better way to do this," said Air Force chief, Gen. Michael "Buzz" Moseley. "I'm not unhappy with the steps that [England] has made in these first steps. There are more steps to go."

Moseley pointed to the need for an overall concept of operations, standardization in how to communicate and guide UAVs, a coherent way to manage all the drones flying around the battlefield and what will be needed to protect drones from an increasing air defense threat.

"This is a recognition of the environment that we have identified as Airmen because this battlespace is something we are very familiar with," Moseley added.

Drones have become an increasingly important part of military operations over the last decade. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have highlighted the need for pinpoint surveillance of enemy activity, given the rugged terrain and inner-city warrens insurgents covet.

The explosion of unmanned systems has led to the recent debate over control of the drone fleet, a matter of particular worry to the Air Force which is concerned that the growing swarms of UAVs could endanger their manned and unmanned planes.

On the other hand, Army officials are reluctant to cede control of their drones for fear they won't be distributed overhead where they're needed most by commanders in combat.

"Now we're in a situation where the Army and the Air Force are essentially competing for production of UAVs. And that's not good," Keys said.

Nevertheless, the Joint Requirements Oversight Council - a Pentagon panel that advises civilian officials on the overall needs of the services - recommended this summer that the Air Force assume the role of "executive agent" for UAVs.

Then England stepped in.

"There's more work to be done; more demonstrating competency to be done; better work on defining requirements; better work on defining capacity. That's ahead of us," Moseley said.

It is unclear how this debate will eventually shake out. With the separate reports that need to be issued, the coordination of procurement and the development of an overall UAV architecture for all the services, there will certainly be more inter-service jockeying as the plans take shape.

"I'm not sure we don't know where every convoy is ... and whether I've got [surveillance] assets in the right place to see what needs to be seen before they drive into an ambush," Keys said. "That's what an executive agent works through to provide the capability to connect all these things."

-- Christian

Drone Cargo Drops

First robot planes took pictures of things too far away or in too dangerous an area for U.S. troops to see.

Then they strapped missiles on the drones, firing them at terrorist targets and knocking out IED emplacers. Robotic killers were born.

Now think about UAVs acting like mini-C-17s.

Trolling through the kiosks at the Air Force Association’s “Air and Space” conference in Washington, I came across a pretty cool product that’s been developed by Textron Defense Systems.

The Universal Aerial Delivery Dispenser is an underwing bomb-like pod that can carry as much as will fit in its nearly five foot-long, eight inch-diameter canister. Weighing in at a bantam 40 pounds unloaded, the “U-ADD” as it’s called, can carry a load of ammo, first aid equipment or other cargo to a pre-selected GPS coordinate. After the UAV drops the canister, a parachute deploys to ease its landing.

Textron’s Richard Sterchele said the U-ADD has been tested already on the RQ-5 Hunter, MQ-9 Reaper and works on the RQ-1 Predator, which can carry about 140 pounds under each wing. He said though the Army hasn’t formally bought the system, the spec ops community has expressed an interest in the system’s ability to deliver covert materiel to remote locations with great stealth.

“I don’t even know some of the things they want to drop with this. And I don’t think I want to know,” Sterchele said.

And, oh, it can also deliver a “lethal,” cluster bomb-like payload or ground sensors and sonobuoys.

-- Christian

Building the Drone Hive

British-based BAE Systems is proposing a sea-going mother ship for unmanned vehicles (UXV) of various types. A BAE news release sent out a few days ago describes the new warship as “the UXV Combatant, designed to operate in a future battle space dominated by land, sea and air unmanned vehicles. Using a proven naval hull form to launch, operate and recover large numbers of small unmanned vehicles for extended periods, the UXV plays the role of mother ship -- a permanent base and control centre for the futuristic unmanned land, sea and air vehicles...”

An artist’s concept of the 8,000-tonne warship shows a low-observable (stealth) design with two large island structures amidships, recessed missile launchers forward, and a large flight deck area aft for operating Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV). The ship’s hull and combat systems will be a development of the Type 45 destroyer.

The first Type 45 destroyer -- HMS Daring -- is now on sea trials. The Royal Navy plans to procure eight of these ships, which have a full-load displacement of some 7,350 tonnes and are 500 feet in length. The gun/missile-armed ship has helicopter facilities.

The UXV support ship, apparently based on an enlarged Type 45 design, will have a lower hangar deck for storing and maintaining UAVs, while the two flight decks will have a variable ski-jump ramp to accelerate the launch of heavily loaded UAVs.

The ship would also support Unmanned Underwater Vehicles (UUV) and Unmanned Surface Vehicles (USV).

While the Royal Navy has made no commitment to construct such a ship, BAE Systems believes that a UXV support ship could be operational by 2020.

The U.S. Navy’s Littoral Combat Ship (LCS) program that is now underway provides for at least three LCS mission configurations -- anti-surface craft, anti-submarine, and mine countermeasures. All of these configurations will make extensive use of UAVs and, depending upon the configuration, will also operate surface and underwater unmanned vehicles.

The U.S. Navy is also developing a large, carrier-based Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV) based on the technology demonstrator designated X-47B. Developed by Northrop Grumman, the UCAV derived from the X-47B will be a multi-mission aircraft with a flying-wing configuration. It will operate from large-deck aircraft carriers. They will operate employing arresting gear and catapults, as do manned aircraft, and they will be integrated into conventional carrier air wings.

But the proposed BAE Systems’ UXV support ship will -- with the U.S. Navy’s LCS program -- be the world’s first specialized ships for operating unmanned vehicles. These will certainly lead to a marked change in the nature of naval operations.

-- Norman Polmar

AF Loses UAV Grip

NEWS FLASH!

From Aerospace Daily...

Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England has halted the U.S. Air Force's controversial push to take over management of the Pentagon's growing Unmanned Air System (UAS) fleet. USAF Chief of Staff Gen. T. Michael Moseley made the proposal in a March 5 memo to take over management of all Pentagon UAS programs. It was met with ire from officials in the Army and Navy.

More from Amy Butler's Aerospace Daily report...

Predator and Sky Warrior are the only programs directly mentioned in his Sept. 13 memo to the services and civilian Pentagon offices. "The Predator and Sky Warrior programs will be combined into a single acquisition program, to include a common data link, in order to achieve common development, procurement, sustainment and training activities," England says. The contract merger should be complete by October 2008, he says. England does not suggest which service should lead this effort.

In lieu of forming an executive agency in the Air Force, England directs that an interagency task force will address how to promote interoperability and efficient operations of UASs.

This decision also relieves the Navy of concerns that the Air Force could subsume oversight of its high-dollar UAS contracts - including the Unmanned Combat Air System-Demonstrator recently awarded to Northrop Grumman and a soon-to-be-decided Broad Area Maritime Surveillance contract.

(Gouge: NC)

-- Christian

Drone Chalks Up First Iraq Kill

So we all heard about killer drones hunting down AQ bigwigs in Afghanistan (and maybe even Pakistan) and Yemen. But now we got word of a new battlefield for the armed drone.

Sure, the MQ-9 "Reaper" has made some headlines in the past, but in what sounds like a first, the Army’s newly armed MQ-5B/C Hunter targeted a team of bad guys implanting a roadside bomb near Qayyarah.

We reported that the Army was to deploy these robot killers to Iraq, but the Pentagon announced this weekend the Hunter’s first kill. The attack occurred on Sept. 1, according to officials in Iraq, but why it took a week to announce the development is anyone’s guess.

Drones are a ubiquitous presence in Iraq. You can hear their lawn-mower buzz overhead all day and all night. I know more than a few Soldiers and Marines who had wished all along that the little plane buzzing overhead could just zap the target itself, rather than force troops to run the IED gauntlet and possibly miss the enemy team.

From MNF-I:

A Hunter unmanned aerial vehicle engaged and killed two suspected improvised explosive device emplacers overwatching a major thoroughfare for Coalition Forces during a historic flight near Qayyarah, Iraq, in Nineveh province Sept. 1.

A scout weapons team from 2nd Battalion, 25th Aviation Regiment, 25th Combat Aviation Brigade, observed the two unknown enemy fighters in a tactical overwatch near the roadside. The SWT requested support from the Hunter UAV.

The pilots guided the Hunter operator to the scene where it set up for a strike mission and dropped its precision munition, killing both unknown enemies and marking a first in Army Aviation history.

"It’s very humbling to know that we have set an Army historical mark in having the first successful launch in combat from an Army weaponized UAV," said Capt. Raymond Fields, commander, Unmanned Aerial Surveillance Company. "This would not be possible without my Soldiers and civilians working hard day in and day out in Iraq to accomplish this feat."

Fields continued, "I think that this success will set the tone for Army Aviation in years to come. We will see more weaponized Army unmanned vehicles being used instead of manned platforms to save not only our aviator brethren but our Army ground brethren from enemy contact."

"This accomplishment adds a precise and discriminate means for our Army to successfully engage the enemy in counterinsurgency warfare," said Col. A.T. Ball, commander, 25th CAB.

(Gouge: NC; Photo: Defense Update)

-- Christian

MiG Combat Drone Revealed

MiG revealed a full-scale engineering mock-up of its unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) design August 23, nicknamed Skat (Skate). Work on the low-observable design began over two years ago, and MiG will produce a flight worthy prototype within 24-months.

The MiG program is one of two competing designs that will be presented to the Russian Defense Ministry as a strike UCAV. Sukhoi is also understood to be working on a UCAV.

MiG unveiled the program during the Moscow air show, though only a few journalists were taken off the show site to a MiG facility at the Gromov flight test research institute.

Skat has two internal weapons bays, capable of carrying air-to-surface missiles as large as the Kh-31 (AS-17 Krytpon). Possible roles include the suppression and attack of enemy air defenses.

MiG is working with a number of Russian companies and state institutes -- including the 2nd Central Scientific Research Institute -- on Skat. The institute is known to be closely involved in low-observable research and development...

Read the entire article HERE.

(Starting soon, Defense Tech and Military.com will be featuring frequent articles from our friends at Aviation Week. Stay tuned...more's on the way.)

-- Christian

A Day in the Life of the X-47

Northrop Grumman – builder of the X-47B Navy unmanned combat air system demonstrator – delivered an interesting brief in Washington, D.C., last week on what a typical mission would look like for one of its flying-wing design robot airplanes.

Company officials working on the project are realistic about naval aviators' enthusiasm when they consider sharing their carrier decks with an unmanned drone. That’s why the Navy’s putting money toward the UCAS-D program. They want to make sure the system can integrate seamlessly into the current naval flight environment with no major changes to naval operations with manned aircraft.

No one doubts this is a tall order. But over the years many of the most difficult aspects of carrier aviation have been tested with unmanned systems, including carrier landings and take-offs and integrating drones into the pattern for approaches and traps. In fact, Northrop Grumman engineers tested a business jet equipped with a drone brain out of Patuxent River Naval Air Station in December where they simulated a carrier approach and integrated into a virtual pattern of other landing aircraft.

Here is how an X-47B mission would go:

A deck handler (also known as a "yellow shirt" in carrier parlance) will use a wrist-mounted display and a hand-held joy stick to maneuver the drone from the hangar bay elevator into position on the flight deck. The plane’s jet engine, of course, powers it on the deck, but the deck handler’s controller adjusts throttle position and braking.

When it's time to gas up, fuel will be pumped into the drone through an inlet hidden within the landing gear housing and up to six small diameter bombs can be loaded into each recessed bomb bay using the same winching system featured on the F-35 Lightening II.

The yellow shirt's job is over once the drone is maneuvered into the catapult shuttle. Hook up to the catapult and shuttle is the same as any other aircraft. All hand signals stay the same as well.

“One of the goals we had is we couldn’t change any of the procedures on the flight deck. Our plane had to look like every other plane on the flight deck and act the same way,” said Northrop Grumman UCAV program official, retired Rear Adm. Tim Beard.

The catapult shot is like that of any other manned aircraft. Company officials noted that F/A-18s fire off the ship autonomously anyway (pilots keep there hands off the stick during cat shots), so the initial launch isn’t a huge technological or cultural stretch. Once airborne the drone will fly a pre-loaded profile, but the profile can be updated as the mission progresses.

The X-47B will complete its mission and be directed by its operator to take its place in the stack of returning manned – and unmanned – aircraft approaching the carrier. This is perhaps the most difficult part of the developmental test regimen for engineers and Navy officials. But Northrop Grumman program managers are confident there won’t be any huge surprises.

At about 200 nautical miles from the ship, the drone communicates its position and is relayed automatic routing information by the control station aboard the carrier. Similar data can be transmitted to the manned aircraft so each plane can take its place in the landing order.

“In effect, each pilot is getting signals of airspeed, heading and altitude to bring him or her [or it] down to the ship,” Beard explained. “Theoretically, with all-digital cockpits and the architecture we’ve got in the airplanes, everyone can couple up and be fully automated from 50 nautical miles in.”

At three quarters of a mile, the LSO near the fantail and the Air Boss in the tower have to decide whether the drone will be allowed to come aboard - just as they make that decision with manned jets. The LSO will have a switch at his station that will send a signal to the flight control computer below decks, then out to the UAV that says to the plane “you’re allowed to come aboard.”

“At the same time, if the Air Boss sees something go wrong on the flight deck he’s got a button that he can hit and the airplane will take a wave off,” Beard said. The LSO has a similar switch as well.

“It’s exactly the same thing we do with manned airplanes at sea,” Beard said.

At about 50 feet from the ship, a precision GPS system that triangulates data down to a couple of inches from the landing wire figures position data between a GPS receiver on the drone, one on the ship and the inertial navigation system.

The UCAS-D will be tested to Case I, III and III landing standards. But even in the worst weather imaginable, the X-47B drone won’t give humans heartburn, Beard said.

As soon as the wheels of the drone hit the deck, the plane powers up for a touch-and-go in case of a miss, just like manned aircraft. At a programmed deceleration of the trap wire, the drone initiates “trap logic” that pulls the power to idle, returns control of the aircraft from the mission operator below to the yellow shirt who uses his controller to taxi the robot plane to a parked position.

No matter how smooth the process looks on paper, and no matter how many times this scenario has been tested on computer simulators or other aircraft, Northrop Grumman officials acknowledge they have a big job ahead of them and a lot of minds to change in the process.

“We’re talking about a real leap in confidence,” Beard admitted. “But it’s a process of education.”

-- Christian

Army Eyes Helo-Drone

The Army is considering sending a revolutionary new kind of unmanned aerial vehicle to Iraq that can hover at 20,000 feet over the battlefield for more than eight hours, transmitting infrared and optical imagery to commanders on the ground.

The MQ-8B Fire Scout tactical unmanned aerial vehicle system - which only a few years ago seemed all but dead - is one system Army Vice-Chief of Staff Gen. Richard Cody requested this summer as a possible answer to an urgent battlefield need for unmanned surveillance in Iraq.

Officials with Fire Scout manufacturer Northrop Grumman told Military.com the Army could make a decision on whether to field the vertical take-off and landing drone by the end of August.

If all goes according to plan, the company could field as many as eight MQ-8Bs to units in Iraq by mid-2008.

"We want to get the Army to fly the Fire Scout as early as possible," said Rick Ludwig, Northrop Grumman's director of business development for UAV systems.

The Army is interested in technology like the Fire Scout - which is based on the manned Schweizer 333 helicopter - for its Future Combat Systems Class IV UAV, one of the few drone systems to survive major Army budget cuts in next year's Defense appropriations request.

While the Navy is forging ahead on a ship-board version of the Fire Scout, the Army has yet to decide on some of the critical hardware and software configurations for the FCS version, Ludwig said.

The Fire Scout was originally intended to replace the Marine Corps RQ-2A Pioneer surveillance drone but was shelved in 2002 in favor of the RQ-7B Shadow.

The Navy breathed new life into the Fire Scout program in 2004 to augment its fleet of SH-60 Sea Hawks on future surface ships. The Army began looking at the MQ-8 in 2003 for its FCS drone fleet.

According to Joe Emerson, Northrop Grumman's FCS drone program manager, the Army wants its FCS-capable Fire Scout to have aerial mine detection capability and tactical signals intelligence hardware.

An Iraq deployment in the near term, however, would include infrared sensors and electro-optical cameras to give commanders a birds-eye view of the battlefield. The main sticking point for the Army version remains which flight control system the service wants to use for the drone, Ludwig added.

"They still have to decide what they want in it," he said.

The Navy is on track to field the Fire Scout in the anti-mine, anti-sub and intelligence gathering configurations in 2009 aboard Littoral Combat Ships, Ludwig said. Northrop Grumman is also working on ways to arm the drone with anti-ship munitions, including a variation of the brilliant anti-armor munition, which can orbit autonomously in search of a target after launch.

-- Christian

The Robot Plane Lives

Standing before the ominous-looking scale mockup of Northrop Grumman’s X-47B Unmanned Combat Air System, the Navy’s top science and technology official proclaimed the service’s commitment to unmanned air vehicles and their application for future naval combat.

Sort of.

Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and Acquisition Dolores Etter was decidedly cool in her support the UCAS, describing in a very legalistic way as a “demonstration” and “prototype” program and an “important” one ... among many, that is.

Northrop Grumman beat out the competition from Boeing last week to build a UCAS demonstrator that will help the Navy figure out how such a combat drone could integrate itself into the carrier air wing.

“There are lots of questions we have to answer as to how this system is going to be able to do the carrier operations,” Etter said.

This has got to be a blow to hard-core UCAV advocates who make a compelling argument that Navy UCAVs need to be integrated onto the CAG yesterday. The Navy’s UCAS program manager, Rear Adm. Tim Heely, outlined the profiles the X-47B is scheduled to fly, including “approaching a carrier, landing on a carrier, taking off on the carrier, multiple approaches – I think it’s around 40 or 30 – approaches and integrating in the air above the carrier and on the carrier. Very critical parts of naval aviation.”

Heely did say aerial refueling will be nixed from the test program, however. But Northrop officials argue that part of testing won’t be tough to surmount.

The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments argued last month the Navy is dragging its feet on UCAS for cultural reasons – human aviators don’t want to share the decks with their robot counterparts. And perhaps Etter’s leukwarm embrace of the drone standing behind her was an indication of that.

CSBA argued X-47B-like drones would give the Navy nearly unlimited persistence over a target and would allow carrier to launch strikes so far from their target that a ship could send a sortie of drones to North Korea, for example, as it is leaving port in Pearl Harbor.

But the Navy’s top UAV official argued in a private interview with Defense Tech that drones such as the X-47B and the MQ-8B Fire Scout could overcome the cultural impediments by take boring jobs such as communications relay and aerial ship inspection missions away from human pilots so that flesh-an-bone aviators can concentrate on more important ones like strike and anti-ship missions.

Clearly, however, yesterday’s address at the AUVSI flight demo with three white-uniform clad Naval officers and their civilian boss standing before this robotic giant demonstrated the beginnings of a major shift in warfare … and in naval aviation culture.

-- Christian

War Shaping Drone Plan

During a conversation with Defense Tech at NAVAIR's Drone-a-palooza today, Capt. Paul Morgan, the program manager for Navy and Marine Corps Unmanned Aerial Systems at NAVAIR, outlined some of the lessons learned from the Iraq war that are affecting how the UAV world is moving forward.

Morgan was obviously concerned about classification issues when the discussion turned toward special operations use of UAVs but he did allow that, for the most part, the snake eaters are happy with what they can do with a UAV at their disposal. Imagine, as a SEAL, knowing where all a hostile ship's gun emplacements are and how many men are on deck as you haul ass across Gulf waters in a RHIB. Or imagine, as a Green Beret, knowing exactly where every insurgent is around the next blind corner as you attempt to work your way through urban areas in a surgical fashion.

The warfighters have been pounding out a steady drumbeat for increasingly capable UAVs in Iraq, and Morgan claims the acquisition machine has responded. "For instance, Shadow went from 'go' decision to fielding in just seven months," he said.

And while everybody likes new and improved stuff, Morgan pointed out the first key to success has been for emerging UAV systems to integrate using as few components as possible. "Less equipment is better," he said. "Nobody's interested in carrying a lot of extra gear around Iraq."

Morgan used the Raven system as an example. Not only did improved batteries provide greater endurance, making the platform more viable in theater, a common infrastructure between the Army and Marine Corps simplified the supply chain once they got there, making life a lot easier for those charged with keeping the drones airworthy.

Talking to the principals on both the goverment and industry sides of the UAV world, one just might get the sense that the Navy's drone program is no longer the grab bag of disjointed efforts without a central vision that it was a few years ago.

"We do have a plan," said Radm. Tim Heely, PEO(W). And referring to the myriad systems that industry has offered up in recent years he added, "We just had to round up the critters and get them in the barn first."

Coming up from Drone-a-palooza: UCAS-D around the carrier and breaking news about a possible Fire Scout deployment in the not-too-distant future.

(Photo: Chucking the Raven airborne)

-- Ward

Drone Fest

The Defense Tech team will be out of the office covering the Association for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Systems International flight demo out in southern Maryland today.

We’ll post all the latest in unmanned aerial vehicles and associated technologies as soon as we can. Please check in periodically for updates. In the meantime excuse our tardiness on posts – there’s certain to be a lot for us to share with DT readers.

Don't touch that dial . . .

-- Christian and Ward

Northrop-Grumman Selected for Navy UCAS Demo

Our homies (that's right, we're street-wise) at NAVAIR just forwarded us this press release:

NAVAIR Patuxent River, MD -- The Department of Navy announced today that Northrop Grumman Systems Corp., Integrated Systems – Western Region, San Diego, Calif., has been selected to provide the Navy Unmanned Combat Air Systems Technical Demonstration.
This $635.8 Million Cost Plus Incentive Fee contract will launch a technical effort to demonstrate the aircraft carrier suitability of an autonomous low-observable unmanned air vehicle, as well as demonstrate critical aircraft carrier suitability technologies in a relevant environment.

“Today’s announcement is a significant milestone towards understanding and mastering autonomous and low-observable flight in the maritime environment,” said Dr. Delores Etter, assistant secretary of the Navy for research, development and acquisition. “The determined effort, long hours and hard work by both the Government team and our industry partner will build on the knowledge gained in previous joint unmanned combat system efforts and help us launch follow-on developmental efforts in the future.”

Specifically, the effort, which is scheduled to conclude in 2013, will involve shipboard operation, including catapult takeoffs, arrested landings and flight in the immediate vicinity of an aircraft carrier. The air vehicle will not carry weapons.

“This specific contract is for technology development and demonstration and will not be an operational system” explained Navy Capt. Rich Brasel, program manager for NAVAIR’s technology demonstration effort here. “But through it, we will develop knowledge, skills and technologies specific to operating an autonomous low-observable unmanned air vehicle in an aircraft carrier environment. This is a critical step in efforts to develop future Naval Aviation combat capabilities.”

Specific products of the effort, referred to as “UCAS-D,” are expected to include flight test data, test reports, trade studies, simulation, and detailed engineering analyses to enable future developmental efforts, according to Brasel.

The contractor-provided system will be comprised of two unmanned, low-observable air vehicles, two mission control segments, and a support segment. The system will be capable of autonomous launch, recovery and operations in the Carrier Control Area.

Flight testing is scheduled to begin in late 2009 and culminate with carrier flight operations in 2013.

(Photo - The X-47's maiden flight)

(Gouge: JM)

-- Ward

Laser Drone for the Corps

Science advisors to the Marine Corps brigade deployed to western Iraq are eyeing a concept for a new flying drone armed with lethal and non-lethal weapons