The U.S. Navy deployed the hand-launched AeroVironment Puma unmanned aircraft system (UAS) from a coastal patrol ship to provide area surveillance during recent missile-system testing in Arabian Gulf. The service has also tested the small UAS from guided missile destroyers and an expeditionary fast transport ship, and it is currently training sailors to operate the system.

During Griffin missile system testing July 19 through 25, sailors launched the RQ-20A Puma AE (all environment) from the USSMonsoon, a Cyclone-class coastal patrol ship. The Monsoon is one of 10 patrol coastal ships assigned to Patrol Coastal Squadron 1, which is home-ported in Manama, Bahrain, in the U.S. 5th Fleet area of operations.

The fixed-wing Puma AE weighs about 14 pounds and provides more than three hours of flight time to a range of 15 km (9 miles) and altitude of 500 feet. It has a gimbaled payload with electro-optical and infrared cameras that stream video and imagery to its ground control station and remote terminals.

“The goal was to put Pumas on ships that don’t have a helicopter or an organic airborne capability of some kind,” stated Inez Kelly, Office of Naval Research science advisor. “The Pumas and other small UAVs give those platforms some eyes in the sky they never had before. They allow ships to have better situational awareness of where they are by providing an overlook capability.”

The Navy has also deployed the Puma AE from the DDG-class guided-missile destroyers USSGonzalez and USSStout. The service also recently used the aircraft aboard an expeditionary fast transport ship in support of counter-trafficking operations in the Caribbean, AeroVironment said.

AeroVironment developed the Puma AE for a U.S. Special Operations Command program in 2008, and it has subsequently supplied the system to Navy Expeditionary Combat Command coastal riverine forces as well as the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. The Department of Defense recently designated the improved block 2 version as RQ-20B.

The Navy plans to use the Puma AE for missions including search and rescue of missing personnel; boarding, search and seizure operations; area surveillance and range clearance during gunnery exercises. Operated by a two-man crew, it can be flown manually or programmed for GPS-based autonomous flight. The Navy is training different job categories of sailors at the Marine Corps training facility on Camp Lejeune, N.C., to operate the system.

Puma recovery is accomplished autonomously by using a net system on the ship, or by retrieving the aircraft as it floats in the water. Detecting it on the ocean’s surface can be difficult, however, the Navy reports.

“When we land a Puma in the water, sometimes [it is[ hard to find,” said Navy senior chief electronics technician Anthony Witters. “It does have an infrared strobe on it, but depending on the day or how it’s sitting in the water, we do face some challenges finding it.”

General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) said it performed a missile-tracking test using two MQ-9 Predator B remotely piloted aircraft during a recent naval exercise in Hawaii. The Pacific Dragon exercise was conducted June 20-28 from the Pacific Missile Range Facility in Kauai, Hawaii.

Under a contract with the U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA), GA-ASI supplied two Predator Bs equipped with the Raytheon Multi-spectral Targeting Systems-B (MTS-B) sensor system to detect and track a ballistic missile target. The Predator Bs also participated in exercises with U.S. Navy vessels, GA-ASI said.

“The test provided valuable data in our ongoing effort to develop an effective airborne missile defense capability,” stated CEO Linden Blue, in an announcement on August 16.

The MDA plans to develop and test several new technologies, including UAVs, to intercept and destroy ballistic missiles during the ascent phase of flight. “By leveraging unmanned aerial vehicles and space assets for pervasive over-the-horizon sensor netting, the engagement zone of current Standard Missile-3 interceptors can be extended to the pre-apogee portion of a missile’s engagement,” the agency states on its website. “Early intercept can provide an extended engagement layer that avoids wasteful salvos by shooting an interceptor, assessing the attempted intercept, and shooting again if unsuccessful.”

Separately, on August 15 the Department of Defense announced a $371 million U.S. Air Force contract award to GA-ASI to supply 30 MQ-9 Reaper production aircraft. The completion date of the contract, which is supported by Fiscal Year 2014 and 2015 procurement funds, is May 31, 2019.

Stemme AG subsidiary Ecarys is expanding its production facility in Strausberg, Germany, to fulfill an order from France’s Safran for 15 ES15 fixed-wing aircraft. Safran will convert the ES15 into the Patroller unmanned aircraft for the French army.

In an August 19 press release, Ecarys said it has “made space for another 10 to 15 development engineers” at a technology center in Strausberg to prepare for the production ramp-up. The company is based at Strausberg airfield east of Berlin.

Earlier this year, Safran and Ecarys signed an agreement for the supply of one prototype and 14 further ES15 platforms. Stemme, a German sports aircraft manufacturer, developed the ES15 in cooperation with the Technical University of Dresden.

Sagem was formally announced as the winner of the French army’s tactical drone system program in April, and 14 aircraft are funded in the military’s spending bill for 2014-2019. The Patroller will replace the Sagem Sperwer tactical drone used by the army’s 61st Artillery Regiment beginning in 2018.

The Patroller carries a 250 kg payload, flies to 20,000 feet and has 20 hours’ endurance. A Euroflir 410 gyrostabilized optronic pod is mounted under the aircraft’s forward fuselage, and it can also carry radar and signals intelligence payloads. The maximum takeoff mass of the ES15 is 1,100 kg (2,425 pounds); the Patroller’s is higher because of the modifications, Ecarys said.

“We are proud to be able to say that the ES15 has contributed to the success of the Patroller, and look forward to being a dependable partner for Safran into the future,” said Paul Masschelein, Ecarys CEO.

Ecarys has received 17 orders for the ES15 thus far this year. Asked about the additional orders, Ecarys said a border agency from a European Union member country that it could not name has ordered the manned version of the aircraft for surveillance.

Raytheon announced a subcontract from Northrop Grumman valued at up to $104 million to modernize the ground control segment of the U.S. Air Force’s RQ-4 Global Hawk unmanned aircraft. The subcontract is among recent enhancements announced for the high-flying surveillance platform. Last September, the Air Force awarded Northrop Grumman an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract worth up to $3.2 billion for Global Hawk development, modernization, retrofit and sustainment activities.

On August 22, Raytheon said it will develop and install “building-based” mission control stations to replace shelter-based stations at Beale Air Force Base in California and Grand Forks AFB in North Dakota. Modernized mission control stations will be based on an open architecture to give the Air Force flexibility for using different mission payloads, the company said.

One new sensor will be the UTC Aerospace Systems MS-177 multi-spectral imaging camera. At the Farnborough Airshow in July, UTC said it was awarded a contract to support integration and testing of the MS-177 on the RQ-4B Global Hawk. Recent years’ enhancements to the sensor system include a gimbaled optical design, a wide area search mode and a motion imagery mode, enabling it to collect “greater than six-times more area coverage per hour“ than the current SYERS-2B sensor used on the U-2 manned surveillance aircraft.

UTC said it also has a study contract from Lockheed Martin to integrate the MS-177 system into the Air Force’s Distributed Common Ground System, which collects, processes and disseminates information from multiple platforms and sensors.

In a separate development in July, aerostructures manufacturer Triumph Group, of Berwyn, Pa., said it had signed a new memorandum of understanding with Northrop Grumman to ramp-up production rates. Triumph’s Vought Aircraft division near Dallas builds the composite wing of the Global Hawk.

“We are implementing multiple process and production improvements to significantly reduce flow days,” said Triumph president and CEO Dan Crowley. “We’re making important investments in tooling and talent to improve schedule, quality and cost for the systems.”

Asked for more detail about the production ramp-up, Northrop Grumman said that rates of particular components fluctuate but that it has “more production ahead of us than behind us” to supply five Global Hawks to NATO, four to South Korea and three more to the Air Force (through 2017) as well as the MQ-4C Triton maritime derivative for the U.S. Navy, which has a requirement for 68 aircraft.

Aircraft insurance provider USAIG is offering a new safety program for policyholders who insure small unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), the company announced yesterday. The initial offering under its new Performance Vector Unmanned program is an online small-UAS ground school course provided by Argus Unmanned, a new division of aviation data services company Argus International of Cincinnati.

The course covers the aeronautical information the FAA will require for the unmanned aircraft general examination. Under the agency’s Part 107 regulation, which takes effect on August 29, the operator of a small drone weighing less than 55 pounds must have a remote pilot certificate with a small-UAS rating. Certificate holders must pass an initial aeronautical knowledge test or have an existing non-student Part 61 pilot certificate.

USAIG's program builds on Performance Vector, a safety program started in 2011 for policyholders who insure turbine-powered manned aircraft. “This new initiative addresses a vital need by including one remote pilot’s ground school with any UAS policy,” said Paul Ratté, USAIG director of aviation safety programs. “Another plus is that discounted rates are available for additional trainees.”

The Federal Aviation Administration granted 76 waivers to its new Part 107 regulation on August 29, the effective date of its rule governing the commercial use of small unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) weighing less than 55 pounds. Those waivers—allowing exceptions to the regulation’s operating conditions—mostly involve flying at night, said FAA Administrator Michael Huerta.

During a briefing at the U.S. Department of Transportation headquarters in Washington, D.C., Huerta and Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx marked the first official day of the Part 107 rule, which the FAAreleased in final form on June 21 after a decade or more in development. Brian Wynne, president and CEO of the Association of Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI), accompanied them on stage.

Part 107 requires that individuals who plan to operate a small UAS, or drone, for money obtain a remote airman certificate and fly the aircraft no higher than 400 feet above the ground, no closer than 400 feet from a structure, within visual line-of-sight and only during daylight hours. Operations within any class of airspace other than in Class G uncontrolled airspace require permission from ATC.

Until the regulation became effective, individuals and companies seeking to fly drones for commercial purposes had to apply for an exemption under the Section 333 provision of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012. The agency estimates there could be as many as 600,000 drones used commercially in the first year of the rule, Huerta said.

The regulation does not allow beyond visual line-of-sight (BVLOS) operations, flights over people who are not involved in the operation and flights at night. The FAA plans to release a draft rulemaking by the end of the year on flying over people, and, separately it will develop rules for BVLOS operations, Huerta said. For now, however, Part 107 allows for exceptions to the operating conditions through a waiver process, something commenters sought after a draft of the rule was released to the public.

“The draft proposal that we published for public comment in February of 2015 required everyone to fly within the limitations of the rule and it did not provide for exceptions,” Huerta explained. “During the comment period, a number of people told us they believed this was too rigid and would unnecessarily stifle innovation and opportunity. So they suggested that we include a process by which people could get authorization to operate outside the basic boundaries of the rule, provided we could determine that these operations could be conducted safely. We listened; we considered that suggestion.”

As of the first day of the rule, more than 3,000 people had signed up to take the 60-question aeronautical knowledge test, called the Unmanned Aircraft General (UAG) examination. The FAA also granted 76 waivers to the regulation’s operating conditions, of which 72 were for operations at night. Some of the waiver requests were initiated under the Section 333 process, Huerta said. Among the recipients were cable news network CNN, BNSF Railway and aerial data company PrecisionHawk, which are participating in the FAA’s “Pathfinder” program for drone research into BVLOS operations and flights over people. Separately, CNN announced on August 29 that it has received a waiver to fly the Fotokite Pro, a tethered, camera-equipped quadcopter that weighs less than two pounds, for operations over people.

Reacting to the first day of the Part 107 rule, the Air Line Pilots Association (Alpa) said the regulation is “missing a key component” that would ensure all people who operate drones commercially have a standard level of aeronautical knowledge and training. “Throughout the rulemaking process, Alpa urged the FAA to take a stronger stance to ensure that those who remotely pilot sUAS for commercial purposes are fully trained and are able to demonstrate knowledge via a written test and skills via a flight test before they are issued a commercial pilot certificate for sUAS, just as pilots of manned aircraft operated for commercial purposes do,” the association stated.

Alpa also called upon Congress to give the FAA more authority to regulate the recreational use of drones.

The U.S. Army is evaluating a small multi-rotor drone to collect information on adversaries for analysis by cyber and military intelligence officers. The service has tested the unmanned aircraft—as yet unnamed—during training exercises at Fort Irwin, Calif., in the Mojave Desert, site of its national training center (NTC).

In an August 26 release, the Army Cyber Command said the drone supported the 1st Armored Brigade Combat Team from Fort Riley, Kan., during a two-week training rotation at the NTC earlier in the month.

The command posted a photograph of what appeared to be a quadcopter carrying a radio-like device with an antenna on its underside and a separate box above the rotors. “The vehicle is designed to collect information on an adversary for analysis by cyber operators and military intelligence personnel,” the command said. “That information is ultimately provided to brigade commanders for their use.”

During actual combat operations, commanders benefit from the speedy delivery of “tactical insights,” said Maj. Deonand Singh, an operations officer with the 781st Military Intelligence Battalion at Fort Meade, Md.

Established in 2010, the Army Cyber Command is in the process of consolidating its different locations at Fort Gordon, Ga., where a new headquarters will be completed by 2019.

The U.S. Navy and the Canadian Department of National Defence have signed an agreement providing for delivery of the Insitu RQ-21A Blackjack to Canada, the first foreign military sale of the unmanned aircraft system (UAS). The agreement calls for delivering one system to the Canadian Army next year, according to the U.S. Naval Air Systems Command (Navair).

A variant of Insitu’s catapult-launched Integrator small tactical UAS, the RQ-21A achieved initial operational capability with the U.S. Marine Corps in January. It is currently deployed with the amphibious transport dock ship USSSan Antonio andcompleted its first operational flight on July 5, Navair said.

The command announced the Blackjack sale to Canada on August 29. “We are very pleased to have our Canadian allies and neighbors as our first foreign military sales case and we look forward to helping them grow their small tactical UAS capability and ensure maximum interoperability with our assets, if desired,” said Col. Eldon Metzger, the manager of Navair’s PMA-263 program office.

The international sale also helps drive down the unit cost of the Blackjack, said Navair, which selected the platform in 2010 under the small tactical unmanned aircraft system (STUAS) program. The command awarded Insitu a $71 million contract in June for a fifth low-rate initial production lot of six systems, and a full-rate production review is expected this fall, according to the manufacturer. The Marine Corps has a requirement for 32 RQ-21A systems; the Navy’s requirement is for 25.

A Blackjack system consists of five air vehicles, two ground control stations and launch and recovery equipment. The aircraft is 8.2 feet long with a 16-foot wingspan. It has a maximum takeoff weight of 135 pounds and carries a standard payload consisting of an electro-optic imager, mid-wave infrared imager, laser rangefinder, infrared marker, communications relay and automatic identification system transponder.

On March 21 for the first time, Marine Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Squadron 2 flew the Blackjack in Class D controlled airspace over Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, N.C., achieving a milestone in the effort to integrate UAS in the airspace with manned aircraft.

The Class D airspace consists of a five-mile radius of the air station, from ground level to 2,500 feet. “This is airspace that is constantly under the control of Cherry Point air traffic control, and is frequently busy with military air traffic, as well as contracted commercial flights landing and departing the air station,” the service said.

The FAA has named 35 business, association, municipal and academic leaders to serve on a new Drone Advisory Committee (DAC) to advise it on introducing unmanned aircraft into the national airspace system. RTCA, a not-for-profit organization that functions as a federal advisory body to the FAA, announced the membership on August 31.

The committee’s first public meeting is scheduled for September 16 at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.

FAA Administrator Michael Huerta revealed the agency’s plan to establish a drone committee representing industry at the Xponential 2016 conference in New Orleans in May. He said he had asked Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, who is a pilot, to serve as its chairman. The DAC is modeled on the high-level NextGen Advisory Committee the FAA formed in 2010—also under RTCA’s auspices—to advise it on ATC modernization.

Innovation in unmanned aircraft systems “is moving at the speed of Silicon Valley. So it only makes sense that we asked a Silicon Valley leader to help us with this important step,” Huerta said in May. The DAC“is intended to be a long-lasting group that will essentially serve the same purpose as the FAA’s NextGen Advisory Committee,” he added.

“The NAC has helped the FAA hone in on improvements that mean the most to the industry and has helped build broad support for our overall direction. And we envision the drone advisory panel playing the same role on UAS integration, including helping us prioritize our work.”

RTCA announced the following members of the committee: Greg Agvent, CNN; Deborah Ale Flint, Los Angeles World Airports; Juan Alonso, Stanford University; Mark Baker, Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association; Jaz Banga, Airspace Technologies; Linden Blue, General Atomics; Robert Boyd, Riley County, Kan.; Tim Canoll, Air Line Pilots Association; Nancy Egan, 3D Robotics; Trish Gilbert, National Air Traffic Controllers Association; Martin Gomez-Vesclir, Facebook; Todd Graetz, BNSF Railway; David Green, Wisconsin Bureau of Aeronautics; Ryan Hartman, Insitu; Robert Isom, American Airlines; and Gur Kimchi, Amazon Prime Air.

Also named were: Ed Lee, mayor of San Francisco; Nancy Leveson, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Dave Mathewson, Academy of Model Aeronautics; Nan Mattai, Rockwell Collins; Houston Mills, UPS; Marily Mora, Reno-Tahoe Airport Authority; Christopher Penrose, AT&T; Steven Rush, Professional Helicopter Pilots Association; Lillian Ryals, MITRE Corporation; Robie Samanta Roy, Lockheed Martin; Paola Santana, Matternet; Ed Sayadian, Harris Corporation; Brendan Schulman, DJI Technology; Phil Straub, Garmin International; Dave Vos, Google X; Brian Wynne, Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International;  Robert Young, PrecisionHawk; Matthew Zuccaro, Helicopter Association International.

Mitre Corporation announced the winners of its Countering Unmanned Aircraft Systems (C-UAS) Challenge to demonstrate systems that detect and stop drones weighing less than five pounds that present a safety or security risk. A total of 42 applicants from eight countries responded to the challenge, which included a live flight evaluation at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va., from August 10 to 18.

Eight finalists competed in one or more of three categories to demonstrate aspects of a counter-drone system: detection and determination; interdiction; and end-to-end system. Mitre awarded $80,000 to Van Cleve and Associates of Alexandria, Va., for demonstrating both the best detection/determination and end-to-end systems with DroneRanger. The system’s key components are a 360-degree scanning radar and a positioning system that integrates visual and thermal imagery and radio frequency jammers.

Demonstrating the best interdiction system was Open Works Engineering of Riding Mill, UK, which was awarded $20,000. The company’s SkyWall 100 system consists of a compressed air powered launcher and an “intelligent projectile” that deploys a net to entangle a drone.

Other finalists were: DroneTracker by DeDrone, of Kassel, Germany and San Francisco; Dronebuster by Radio Hill Technologies of Portland, Ore.; Icarus System by Lockheed Martin of Bethesda, Md.; DroneBlocker by TrustComs/Trifecta Global of Versailles, France, and Beltsville, Md.; Knox System by MyDefense Communications of Sundby, Denmark; and Mesmer System by Department 13 International of Columbia, Md. Mitre awarded an honorable mention to a team from Duke University.

The U.S. east and west coasts converged on September 16 as the new Drone Advisory Committee (DAC) that will make recommendations to the Federal Aviation Administration on integrating drones into the national airspace system held its inaugural meeting in the nation’s capital.

Present at the three-sided table were the leaders of several aviation trade associations based in the Washington, D.C. area, sitting alongside senior executives of companies including online retailer Amazon of Seattle and California-based Google and Facebook. Brian Krzanich, CEO of Santa Clara, California-based Intel Corp., is chairman of the committee, which also counts as members San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee and Deborah Flint, CEO of Los Angeles World Airports.

FAA Administrator Michael Huerta announced the plan to establish a drone committee representing industry and other “stakeholders” at the Xponential 2016 conference in New Orleans in May. In late August, the agency named 35 members to the DAC from the 400 people who expressed interest. Plans call for the committee to meet three times a year for two years; much of its detailed work will likely be done in smaller working groups.

The DAC is modeled on the FAA’s NextGen Advisory Committee, which has advised the agency in setting priorities for its long-running, multibillion-dollar effort to modernize the U.S. air traffic control system. Standards organization RTCA, which has official status as an advisory body to the FAA, administers both of the committees.

In basic terms, the DAC represents a confluence of the innovation in unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) coming in large part from California’s Silicon Valley and the Pacific Northwest, with the regulatory and political interests of the mainstream aviation industry centered in Washington, D.C. Giving opening remarks at the first meeting, Huerta noted that some members of the committee hail from the traditional aviation community where safety is a paramount focus; others come from “the entrepreneurial community, where taking risks and making bets is in your DNA.”

Huerta added: “We intentionally brought these distinct cultures together, and I’m not asking any of you to change your views.” Instead, he asked the group to agree on recommendations for the further integration of drones into the airspace system, and in the process “infusing it with the safety margin that the public expects and deserves.”

At least at the outset, the FAA appears committed to the effort. Joining Huerta at the table were several top FAA executives, including acting deputy administrator Victoria Wassmer, Air Traffic Organization chief operating officer Teri Bristol, associate administrator for aviation safety Peggy Gilligan, assistant administrator for policy, international affairs, environment and energy Jennifer Solomon, senior advisor for UAS integration Marke “Hoot” Gibson, and Earl Lawrence, director of the UAS Integration Office.

Lawrence briefed the committee on the immense challenge the FAA faces in regulating potentially hundreds of thousands of commercial drones and in maintaining safety with potentially millions more being flown by hobbyists. Some 12,000 people have applied to the FAA to operate drones commercially since the agency’s new Part 107 regulation took effect on August 29, and more than 500,000 have registered hobby drones through the agency’s on-line system. “It’s more than our traditional aviation profile,” Lawrence said. “The community is much larger and more diverse. What’s really unique is the sheer volume of operations and [their] personal nature.”

For example, Lawrence noted that the “follow-me” capability of some drones is not typical for aviation. “How do we deal with that? That’s not a Point A to Point B operation,” he observed.

Krzanich, who is a licensed pilot, said his goal as DAC chairman “is to make sure that every voice is heard…and that at the end of the day we make a recommendation to the FAA.” When Huerta asked him to lead the committee “it took all of less than 10 seconds to say ‘yes’ because I believe in this industry wholeheartedly,” he added.

The August 29 introduction of the FAA’s new Part 107 regulation making it easier to small unmanned air systems (UAS) weighing less than 55 pounds on a commercial basis was a momentous move toward the more widespread business use of drones. More evidence of this dynamic industry sector’s rapid ascent will be found at the second annual Drone World Expo being staged on November 15 and 16 in San Jose, California, which has quickly developed as a key focal point for companies pioneering commercial applications of UAS technology.

Applications represented at Drone World include imaging, construction, photography and video, precision agriculture, security, public safety, mapping and surveying, inspections, research and conservation, communications, parcel delivery and humanitarian efforts. The show’s detailed conference will feature more than 100 industry experts and is curated by an industry advisory board.

Organizer JD Expo is expecting between 3,000 and 4,000 visitors for the 2016 event, which would be around twice that in 2015. AIN is a media partner for the show as part of its expanding coverage of the UAS industry.

The capability to operate in non-permissive environments against enemy air defenses, manned-unmanned teaming to extend the reach of sensors and autonomy will be key future attributes of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), industry and government experts said September 20 at the Air Force Association (AFA) Air, Space and Cyber conference.

The capability of unmanned aircraft since the U.S. first deployed the MQ-1 Predator in combat in the Balkans in the 1990s has been dramatic. “However, if you look at every place we’ve deployed them, it’s been permissive,” instructed Kenneth Callicutt, U.S. Strategic Command director of capability and resource integration. “I think as we go forward the question is how do I employ this unmanned component in a non-permissive environment and more important, what else can I do with it? We’ve only tapped the beginning of this capability in unmanned air vehicles.”

Callicutt said future unmanned aircraft must operate within a network and be capable of extending the “sensor net” of manned aircraft such as the F-22 and F-35 fighters and the B-21 Raider long-range strike bomber. The must be enabled for the next tactical data network beyond Link 16. “It’s time to start thinking about the next battle network,” Callicutt said. Link 16’s “51 published frequencies cannot be the future battle network.”

James Gear, L3 Communications vice president for advanced systems, listed the ability to operate in non-permissive environments, distributed control of an aircraft’s sensor to more than its operator and expendable versus reusable unmanned vehicles as future priorities. Tom Clancy, Aurora Flight Sciences Corp., vice president of UAS, said unmanned aircraft “should be able to leverage human judgment” and be autonomous in perceiving, deciding and taking action during a mission.

“It’s not about the vehicle, it’s about how they’re employed and what they do to extend the productivity and the reach of the warfighter, whether it’s extending sensor networks, whether it’s automation that allows them to work in less permissive or contested environments because they have a logic that allows them to adapt,” said Christopher Pehrson, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) senior director of strategic development. One capability will be to dynamically reassign missions of networked aircraft in real time, he added.

At the AFA conference, GA-ASI exhibited a full-scale model of a concept sUAS (small UAS) it is developing for the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency’s “Gremlins” program to enable manned aircraft to launch “volleys” of low-cost, reusable UAS equipped with sensors. In March, Darpa awarded GA-ASI and three other companies (Composite Engineering, Dynetics and Lockheed Martin) Phase 1 contracts to develop their respective approaches toward a preliminary design review.

Darpa has specified unmanned vehicles with a 300-mile range that can loiter for an hour and be retrieved in the air by a C-130 transport. Pehrson said GA-ASI wants to develop a vehicle that could also be deployed from the MQ-9 Reaper, which has a maximum takeoff weight of 12,500 pounds and the ability to carry 3,000 pounds externally. The Gremlin concept vehicle the company is developing weighs 700 pounds, meaning the MQ-9 could carry more than one.

Darpa will release Phase 2 proposal to industry shortly to develop a engineering development model prototype, Pehrson said.

Bell Helicopter unveiled a new unmanned tiltrotor aircraft—the V-247 Vigilant—it is proposing for the U.S. Marine Corps. The manufacturer displayed a one-eighth-scale model of the aircraft with a working swiveling wing at a briefing September 22 in Washington, D.C.

Bell has designed the Vigilant to meet a need expressed in the 2016 Marine Aviation Plan for a large, “sea-baseable” unmanned aircraft system (UAS) capable of performing multiple missions. It would be a Group 5 UAS—weighing 16,000 pounds empty, with the ability to carry 13,000 pounds in fuel, weapons such as the MK-50 torpedo, Hellfire or JAGM missiles, and sensors including sonobuoys and LiDAR or radar modules. Advertised mission range is 450 nm, with time on station of 11 hours.

The vertical takeoff and landing machine builds on Bell’s development of the V-280 manned tiltrotor for the U.S. Army’s joint multi-role demonstration program. There is “significant leveraging of V-280 technology” in the Vigilant, said Vince Tobin, Bell vice president for advanced tiltrotor systems. The design also benefits from Bell’s work on tiltrotors dating to the XV-3 in the 1950s, a legacy that includes the unmanned Eagle Eye developed—but never purchased—for a U.S. Navy requirement in the 1990s and the V-22 Osprey used by the Marine Corps, the Air Force Special Operations Command and eventually by the Navy as the CMV-22B.

Sized to be compatible with the Navy’s DDG-class guided-missile destroyers, the single-engine Vigilant has a V-shaped empennage and fixed center wing that swivels from an in-line position to perpendicular of the fuselage. Outboard prop-rotors and wingtips rotate up for vertical flight and down for horizontal flight. The aircraft’s wingspan is 65 feet; its rotors fold out to a diameter of 30 feet. The wingtips fold back over the center wing, which swivels back over the fuselage for stowage.

The Vigilant promises “expeditionary capability with increased operational flexibility and a reduced logistical footprint,” said Tobin. “The real advantage of this is it colocates with the maneuver force and it isn’t reliant on a runway.”

Bell expects the Marine Corps will establish a formal requirement for the ship-based UAS capability soon, leading to the selection of a contractor to begin engineering and manufacturing development. Bell contends it can start building Vigilants by 2023. “The question that we’re asked is how fast can you go? We interpret that [as being] a near-term need,” Tobin said.

Delivery giant UPS and drone manufacturer CyPhy Works have started testing a CyPhy hexacopter to deliver packages to remote locations. On September 22, the companies conducted a mock delivery of urgently needed medicine from Beverly, Mass., to Children’s Island, three miles off the Massachusetts coast.

UPS is not new to the drone industry; the Atlanta-based logistics concern acknowledged last year that it was testing drones to monitor stock in its warehouse facilities. That testing is being done at warehouses in Louisville, Ky., and Venlo, the Netherlands. More recently, Houston Mills, UPS Airlines' director of safety, was named to the FAA’s high-level Drone Advisory Committee, which held its first public meeting on September 16.

Last year, UPS also participated in a multi-state study of using drones for humanitarian missions that was conducted by drone services company Measure on behalf of the American Red Cross. Next month, it will begin flying medical supplies by drone in Rwanda in a partnership with drone company Zipline and Gavi The Vaccine Alliance. Zipline produces a small fixed-wing drone that launches by rail, drops medical supplies by parachute and returns to its base.

In October 2015, the UPS Strategic Enterprise Fund joined other partners to invest $22 million in CyPhy Works, a small company based in Danvers, Mass. Helen Greiner, an MIT-trained roboticist who earlier co-founded “Roomba” manufacturer iRobot, started CyPhy Works in 2008.

Testers deployed the CyPhy Works’ Persistent Aerial Reconnaissance and Communications (PARC) hexacopter to deliver an asthma inhaler to a YMCA camp on the island, which cannot be reached by automobile. They flew the PARC on battery power; it can also operate for days at a time when connected to a powered tether.

“Our focus is on real-world applications that benefit our customers,” said Mark Wallace, UPS senior vice president of global engineering and sustainability. “We think drones offer a great solution to deliver to hard-to-reach locations in urgent situations where other modes of transportation are not readily available.”

Greiner, now CyPhy Works’ chief technology officer, said: “We’re thrilled to partner with UPS in this endeavor. Drone technology used in this way can save lives and deliver products and services to places that are difficult to reach by traditional transit infrastructures.”

Separate from the UPS testing, the “X” research laboratory formerly known as Google[x] is testing food deliveries by drone at Virginia Tech university in Blacksburg, Va. Those tests, conducted with the Mid-Atlantic Aviation Partnership, are using a prototype of the vertical takeoff and landing Project Wing fixed-wing drone.

The U.S. Navy has ordered a first production lot of three MQ-4C Triton unmanned aircraft systems (UAS). The contract award followed five days after the Pentagon approved the program’s initial production phase.

The Naval Air Systems Command on September 22 announced that under secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics Frank Kendall had granted the MQ-4C program “Milestone C” approval to proceed to low-rate initial production (LRIP). On September 27, the Department of Defense announced two related awards to Northrop Grumman: a $255 million contract modification to procure three LRIP Lot 1 Tritons, plus main and forward operating control stations; and a $95 million order for interim spares in support of the aircraft’s initial deployment.

An RQ-4B Global Hawk derivative, the Triton is fitted with the AN/ZPY-3 Multi-Function Active Sensor (MFAS) 360-degree maritime radar, Raytheon’s Multi-Spectral Targeting System electro-optical/infrared sensor turret, automatic identification system, electronic support measures and a communications relay capability to provide “persistent” intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. The Navy plans to deploy the UAS in late 2017 and has expressed an overall requirement for 68 Tritons. Northrop Grumman thus far has built three system development test aircraft.

A test team of Navy personnel from Air Test and Evaluation Squadrons VX-1 and VX-20, Unmanned Patrol Squadron 19 (VUP-19), based at Naval Air Station Jacksonville, Florida, and Northrop Grumman validated sensor imagery and performance at different altitudes and ranges before the Milestone C approval. The Triton also transferred full-motion video to a P-8A Poseidon in flight during the operational assessment.

“Triton’s critical technology is mature, and the system development and design review phases have been successful,” said Doug Shaffer, Northrop Grumman vice president of Triton programs. “Completion of the full system operational assessment testing exercised in various real-world scenarios validated the system’s ability to protect the Navy’s fleet from evolving threats. We are extremely pleased with the maritime domain awareness products and results coming from Triton.”

Textron Systems has at least one potential customer for a vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) version of its Aerosonde small unmanned aircraft system. The Aerosonde Hybrid Quadrotor (HQ) adds four rotors to what is otherwise a catapult-launched fixed-wing aircraft.

“Our customer has asked us for an estimate in terms of time and dollars to get it out there,” said David Phillips, Textron Systems vice president of small and medium endurance UAS. While he declined to identify the interested customer, the majority of Aerosonde users are military services, including the U.S. Marine Corps, Air Force and Special Operations Command.

Textron Systems announced in late April that it had demonstrated a VTOL version of the Aerosonde with assistance from Latitude Engineering and Cloud Cap Technology. The company exhibited a full-sized model for the first time at the Association of the U.S. Army (AUSA) conference that began October 3 in Washington, D.C. It plans to further demonstrate the aircraft later this week at its new Unmanned Systems Service and Support Center in Blackstone, Va.

The Aerosonde has accumulated more than 150,000 flight hours over its history and now operates 6,000 hours a month as a contractor owned and operated service Textron Systems provides to its customers. The Aerosonde HQ, in development since early 2015, “is an application in the field of a kit on a very mature aircraft,” noted Phillips. VTOL capability is accomplished by replacing the twin structural booms of the aircraft with two thicker booms, each supporting two small rotors powered by electric motors. The rotors raise the aircraft from the ground, then align with the booms for aerodynamic efficiency. The Aerosonde’s Lycoming EL-005 heavy-fuel engine propels it in horizontal flight.

The VTOL version of the Aerosonde requires less equipment than even the Flying Launch and Recovery System (Flares) that Insitu has developed for its smaller ScanEagle unmanned aircraft. Not a kit, Flares is a separate quadcopter that lifts the ScanEagle to a launch altitude, then recovers it in flight with a suspended rope. “With four electric, independently powered motors you can get rid of the launch and control element,” Phillips said. “You can be extremely expeditionary.”

There is an “endurance trade” of about 30 percent using the VTOL version, however. In traditional configuration, the Aerosonde is capable of flying for 15 hours; the Aerosonde HQ fitted with an electro-optical/infrared sensor payload stays aloft for eight hours—with 10 hours as the goal, Phillips said.

Textron Systems promotes the 80-pound Aerosonde for missions including intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), signals intelligence and communications relay. The company has discussed with the U.S. Army the possibility of developing a VTOL version of the 460-pound RQ-7B Shadow, but that is not a formal program, Phillips said.

Also at the AUSA conference, Textron Systems unveiled the new “Synturian” system, described as a multi-platform, multi-vehicle, multi-domain control system for unmanned air, ground and sea vehicles. The company envisions Synturian eventually replacing the Army’s current Universal Ground Control Station and One System Remote Video Terminal for controlling and monitoring Shadow and Gray Eagle unmanned aircraft. It also has application for the V-247 Vigilant unmanned tiltrotor aircraft that sister company Bell Helicopter is proposing to the Marine Corps, according to Bell.

A long-awaited definition study that may lead to a pan-European MALERPAS (Medium Altitude Long Endurance Remotely Piloted Aircraft System) finally started last month. But the entry into service of a system that could rival current offerings from Israel and the U.S. is still more than eight years away. Meanwhile, European countries are continuing to acquire the rival systems.

The study is being jointly conducted by Airbus Defence and Space, Dassault Aviation and Leonardo, with an equal work split, for the governments of France, Germany, Italy and Spain. No value for the contract was made public. The European defense procurement agency OCCAR, which is managing the project, said that other states could potentially participate in future phases of the program. The UK has declined to participate and is planning to introduce the General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc. (GA-ASI) Certifiable Predator-B UAS to meet a requirement named Protector.  

OCCAR described the study as a “design-to-cost activity ([that] will further develop and strengthen European industrial expertise in this essential technological area.” The study will take 25 months. A System Requirement Review (SRR) in the first year will be followed by a Preliminary Design Review (PDR) in the second year. “This will give the participating states full confidence that the Development step can be launched with acceptable residual risks,” said OCCAR in a statement. The objectives include full certification and air traffic control (ATC) integration. If the nations approve full development, a first flight could occur in early 2023. 

Dirk Hoke, chief executive officer of Airbus Defence and Space, referred to the need for “sovereignty and independence” in what his counterpart at Dassault, Eric Trappier, decribed as “the strategic field of surveillance drones.” Filipe Bagnato, managing director of Leonardo’s aircraft division, noted the program’s potential to develop “high technologies, capabilities and jobs of fundamental importance within Europe.” 

The air forces of France and Italy already operate GA-ASI Predators or Reapers, and the Spanish air force is now following. The German air force has been operating IAI Heron 1s leased via Airbus Defence and Space, and decided early this year to replace them with three to five larger Heron TPs. That contract is reportedly worth nearly $650 million, and has been legally challenged by GA-ASI, which offered the Certifiable Predator-B to Germany.

More than 40 nations have joined the U.S. in a joint declaration aimed at controlling exports of armed or weapons-capable unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Major UAV-producing nations such as Israel, Russia, China and India are not among signatories to the declaration of broad principles, which is a precursor to setting more detailed standards.

“The declaration is a political commitment by its signatories that underscores growing international consensus that UAVs are subject to international law,” said Mark Toner, deputy spokesman with the U.S. State Department, announcing the agreement on October 5. It “stresses the need for transparency about exports and represents, we believe, an important first step toward comprehensive international standards for the transfer and subsequent use of UAVs.”

The signatories and other nations that wish to participate will begin meeting next spring to hash out specific standards, Toner said.

The “Joint Declaration for the Export and Subsequent Use of Armed or Strike-Enabled UAVs” allows that individual nations may already have laws or policies in place to control the export of armed unmanned aircraft. “However,” states the preamble, “recognizing that misuse of armed or strike-enabled UAVs could fuel conflict and instability, and facilitate terrorism and organized crime, the international community must take appropriate transparency measures to ensure the responsible export and subsequent use of these systems.”

The signatories agreed to five principles: to apply the law of armed conflict and international human rights law to their use of armed drones; to engage in “responsible export” of such aircraft in line with existing arms control and disarmament norms; to stay consistent with existing multinational export-control and nonproliferation regimes; to practice “appropriate voluntary transparency measures” in reporting military exports; and to continue discussing how nations can transfer and use such technology responsibly.

Reacting to the declaration, the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) said that it expects the agreement will lead to “more efficient review and approval of  U.S. exports of these systems,” and that international adoption of guidelines for armed drones will help smooth exports of military surveillance drones as well as unmanned aircraft sold for civilian or commercial purposes.

But the AIA called upon the U.S. government to make its own interagency review and approval process “more transparent, predictable and efficient” to ensure that American-made systems remain competitive against foreign competition.

In addition to the U.S., there are 44 other signatories to the declaration: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, Georgia, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malawi, Malta, Montenegro, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Paraguay, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Republic of Korea, Romania, Serbia, Seychelles, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Ukraine, United Kingdom and Uruguay.

Lockheed Martin deployed a canister-launched small drone from an autonmous underwater vehicle (AUV) during a recent U.S. Navy technology exercise. The four-pound Vector Hawk transmitted video during sorties ranging from 20 to 60 minutes, the manufacturer said.

On the command of its operator, Lockheed Martin’s Marlin MK2AUV launched the Vector Hawk from the surface of Narragansett Bay in Rhode Island during a “cross domain” demonstration at the Annual Naval Technology Exercise in mid-August. A third drone—the Ocean Aero Submaran S10 unmanned surface vehicle— relayed instructions to the Marlin from a ground control station via underwater acoustic communications.

Following launch, the collapsible, fixed-wing Vector Hawk “successfully assumed a mission flight track” and transmitted video from its Perceptor dual sensor gimbal, a miniature payload with electro-optical and infrared imagers and a laser illuminator. Capable of flying and landing autonomously, the drone operates at line-of-sight range of up to 15 km (9.3 miles), for as long as 70 minutes.

 “This effort marks a milestone in showing that an unmanned aircraft, surface vessel and undersea vehicle can communicate and complete a mission cooperatively and completely autonomously,” said Kevin Schlosser, Lockheed Martin chief architect for unmanned systems technology.

Last November, Lockheed Martin said it was awarded a $4.6 million contract from an undisclosed customer for continued development of the maritime canister-launched Vector Hawk. At the time, the manufacturer said it was working on a reconfigurable version of the small unmanned aerial vehicle.

The U.S. Navy plans to equip its attack and guided missile submarines with a similar, tube-launched small drone from AeroVironment named “Blackwing.” The Navy and the U.S. Special Operations Command tested Blackwing under a 2013 joint capability technology demonstration called Awesum, for Advanced Weapons Enhanced by Submarine UAS against Mobile targets, which concluded in September 2015.

At the Association of the U.S. Army annual meeting earlier this month in Washington, D.C., AeroVironment introduced a Multi-Pack Launcher (MPL) system for Blackwing and its cousin, the Switchblade miniature loitering missile. The MPL system is scaleable to accommodate from two to 20 Switchblade/Blackwing rounds and can be reloaded at 30 seconds per round. Future naval versions will provide surface ships with multi-launch capability, the manufacturer said.