Locally Deployed UAVS
Written by Scott R Gourley
SOTECH 2009 Volume: 7 Issue: 8 (October)
In early August 2009, U.S. Special Operations Command representatives announced USSOCOM “interest in research and development of unmanned aircraft system payloads science and technology. The areas of interest include full motion video; signals intelligence; tagging, tracking and locating; communications relay; lasers; 2-D/3-D mapping and automated change detection; and precision-guided weapons.”
The interest comes as no surprise, given the increasingly important and diverse roles being performed by unmanned aerial systems (UAS) in support of tactical operations around the world. Moreover, in parallel with the trend in increasing capabilities, many UAS applications are being “pushed down” to lower and lower levels, moving from runways to “local deployment,” and, in the process, greatly expanding the situational awareness and command capabilities of tactical unit commanders on the ground.
The proliferation of UAS platforms across the Department of Defense has not always been smooth, as evidenced by the findings of a July 2009 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report with the descriptive title, “Opportunities Exist to Achieve Greater Commonality and Efficiencies among Unmanned Aircraft Systems.”
Moreover, the services have seldom agreed on the terminology to identify their different platforms. As examples, one February 2006 GAO study identified the small UAS as weighing less than 10 pounds with an air speed of less than 100 knots, noting that USSOCOM employed Pointer, Raven, Dragon Eye, and Swift platforms in this category. From there, the report jumped to the tactical UAS, which weighs less than 500 pounds with an airspeed of less than 120 knots, where USSOCOM was identified with the Neptune, Tern, Mako, and Tigershark systems. How a category called “small” could then lead to one called “tactical wasn’t totally clear. Then, within a few months of that grouping, the Marine Corps released its own unique Three Tier UAS concept, built on the USMC intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) concept of operations to support different Marine Corps elements down to battalion levels. And all of this was taking place as the U.S. Army was defining four classes of UAS under its original Future Combat System (FCS) architecture. Although the architecture was later revised and the FCS program was terminated earlier this year, two of the original four classes of new Army UAS are now moving forward under that service’s Brigade Combat Team Modernization activity.
One attempt to clarify this service-unique terminology confusion is emerging from the Joint Unmanned Aerial System Center of Excellence (JUAS COE), located at Creech Air Force Base, Nev., where joint service representatives have developed five numbered groups based on the static qualities of the vehicles—things like weight, typical operating altitude, and typical operating speed—that shouldn’t change significantly as technology advances. Broad acceptance of these groupings remains to be seen.
In the meantime, against this occasionally confusing backdrop, SOTECH has opted to focus on the expanding tactical implications of “locally deployed” UAS, primarily covering hand- and catapultlaunched systems. While this grouping does not reflect any single generally accepted category within the formal UAS arena, the representative activities noted here provide excellent examples of the types of new UAS capabilities and technologies now being provided to tactical unit commanders and other warfighters on the ground.
SCANEAGLE
One system that has seen significant applications in this arena is the ScanEagle UAS, a joint effort of Boeing and Insitu (a wholly owned subsidiary of Boeing). Having provided persistent, cost-effective ISR capabilities to the Navy since July 2005, ScanEagle completed its 1,500th shipboard sortie in service with the Navy during the first week of January 2009. In addition, the system has been deployed in support of Marine Corps elements in theater.
The long-endurance, fully autonomous ScanEagle UAS carries inertially stabilized electro-optical and infrared cameras that allow the operator to track both stationary and moving targets. Capable of flying above 16,000 feet and loitering over the battlefield for more than 24 hours, the platform provides persistent low-altitude ISR.
“ScanEagle is launched autonomously from a pneumatic Super- Wedge catapult launcher and flies either preprogrammed or operatorinitiated missions. The Insitu-patented SkyHook system is used to retrieve the UAS, capturing it by way of a rope suspended from a 50-foot-high tower. An innovative hook/catch device at the end of the wing allows the ScanEagle to be flown into the rope and then safely recovered. The recovery system design makes ScanEagle runwayindependent and minimizes its impact on shipboard operations, similar to a vertical-takeoff-and-landing vehicle,” said David Sloan, a Boeing spokesperson.
In terms of special operations employment, ScanEagle was credited with significant ISR/situational awareness contributions during the April 2009 pirate hostage case in which Richard Phillips, captain of the 17,000-ton Maersk Alabama freighter, was taken hostage by Somali pirates off the African coast.
According to an early May 2009 Navy release, data from ScanEagle facilitated the subsequent fatal shooting of three pirates by U.S. Navy SEALs during the successful rescue of Captain Phillips.
In the Maersk Alabama case, the UAS reportedly provided electro-optical and infrared feeds (both still and video) from its sensors, supplying the Navy with critical data and improving its situational awareness during the standoff. Navy sources added that the success of this operation came not long after the USS Mahan captured nine pirates in the sea-lanes off Somalia with the assistance of ScanEagle supplied video-feeds.
In fact, U.S. Naval Special Warfare representatives seem to be sold on ScanEagle’s capabilities, as evidenced by a July 9, 2009, “request for quotation for ScanEagle UAS training prior to system deployment into theater.” “Naval Special Warfare must provide qualified personnel to support ScanEagle unmanned aerial vehicle operations in Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom,” it read, adding, “Personnel will deploy to theater of operations beginning early July 2009 and continue through September 2009 and beyond. Prior to deployment,
personnel must complete formal ScanEagle UAV training.” Three major training tasks were identified: ScanEagle orientation; advanced maintenance skills; and ScanEagle pilot training. Within those arenas, specific training elements included: aviation fundamentals; unmanned aircraft and systems overview; safety and approach theory; aircraft programming; Insitu multiple UAS environment interface; object tracker/target management; setting mission parameters; electronic map creation; ScanEagle video exploitation software tool; forward ground control station; and forward eyes. Looking toward the very near future, the Boeing/Insitu team will soon field a significant expansion of ScanEagle technology through a new “NanoSAR” module. First flight tested aboard ScanEagle in March 2008 by Boeing, in partnership with Insitu and ImSAR LLC, the NanoSAR is described as the world’s smallest synthetic aperture radar (SAR). Packaged as a USA “fuselage plug,” the NanoSAR is a 2-pound system, in contrast to traditional SARs that might weigh 50–200 pounds. The Canadian Defence Force is believed to be the first in line to deploy the NanoSAR capability, which should be available during the fall of 2009.
SHADOW
In addition to deploying ScanEagle, Marine Corps ground elements have also been supported by the Textron Systems (AAI) Shadow UAS (Textron officially acquired United Industrial Corp. and its wholly owned subsidiary AAI Corp. in December 2007), an employment decision that earned that service a positive comment in the July 2009 GAO report noted above: “Several of the tactical and theater-level unmanned aircraft acquisition programs GAO reviewed have identified areas of commonality to leverage resources and gain efficiencies. For example, the Marine Corps chose to procure the Army’s Shadow system after it determined Shadow could meet its requirements, and was able to avoid the cost of initial system development and quickly deliver capability to the warfighter.”
In U.S. Army applications, the Shadow 200 UAS provides reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition and force protection at brigade level. One Shadow system consists of four air vehicles and associated ground control equipment, including two ground control stations and an air vehicle launcher. Shadow is equipped with automatic takeoff and landing capability and operates at up to 15,000 feet in various weather conditions. The air vehicle has electro-optical/infared capabilities. Planned system upgrades include integration of the tactical common data link and the Army’s heavy fuel engine. As a brigade-level asset, the Shadow aircraft is intended to allow for mission payloads to be changed on the aircraft within 30 minutes. In addition, recent system enhancements have been directed toward expanding the system capabilities for supporting the
warfighter.
As an example of these efforts, Steven Reid, AAI vice president of unmanned aircraft systems, points to “a change that was so helpful and so compelling that we’ve actually broken it out and pulled it forward. And that’s our re-wing effort.” Reid continued, “Since the Shadow is essentially flying 24 hours a day, anything we can do to increase its mission endurance will manifest itself in reliability improvements. “Right now there are about four cycles per day in a ‘system,’ with about a 6–6 1/2 mission endurance on each aircraft. By the time you have two birds in the air, with relief on station and things like that, there are about four cycles occurring every day. It looks a little bit like a carrier deck at some of
these sites.”
“Our goal was to reduce that to three cycles per day,” he said. “So we developed what we called the re-wing program, where we increased the wingspan of the aircraft. That allows us to carry additional fuel, because we carry the fuel in a bladder—it’s a ‘wet wing’ if you will. It also increased the payload capacity of the aircraft so that we can carry the larger laser designation payload that we’re starting to field into theater this month. And what that does is take our traditional EO/IR ball and adds laser designation capability to it. So now we are not only doing an ISR mission, but also a target acquisition
mission and a targeting mission.”
Another tactical enhancement example took place in 2007, when AAI—now an operating unit of Textron Systems, a Textron Systems Inc. company—engineers worked with the Prototype Integration Facility in Huntsville, Ala., to repackage a small radio repeater into a small wing extension on the Shadow wing. “So, for about the last year or so, every Shadow that has been flying in theater is carrying as an organic capability—in addition to its
EO/IR payload—this communications relay package and its attendant antennas that are just a part of a modest 6-inch wing extension,” Reid said. “And what that has done is to take ground-to-ground handheld radio capability and extended the range upwards of 80 km. It’s obviously important for ground forces to be able to communicate with each other. And this is such a neat story because Shadow is up there, doing other missions—there are routinely 14 Shadows in the air at any one time over Iraq—and now you can think of it as ‘a network in the sky.’ With just a modest set of resources to develop this thing and put it on every Shadow, it is now performing a secondary mission without any other investment of fuel, personnel or acquisition of aircraft.”Looking toward the future, Army officials have indicated interest in a significant expansion of Shadow applications into the lethal arena, telling investigators for the GAO report that their Marine Corps program partners were “exploring ways to retrofit the Shadow so that it can carry a weapons payload. They stated that although the Army does not have a requirement for a weapons payload and has no plans to spend money on its development, the Army would be interested in
acquiring this capability.”
AEROSONDE MARK 4.7
Another recent effort is the Aerosonde Mark 4.7, which serves as one representative example of the dramatic shift in size, weight and payload that continues in the locally deployed UAS arena. Likening the trends to Moore’s Law in computing, AAI’s Reid offered the example of laser designation. “Back in the 2000-2002 time frame, the Army did have a laser designation capability with one of its UAVs,” he said. “It took a 1,600-pound Hunter to carry a MOSP [mission optronic stabilized payload] 770 payload that weighed upwards of 100-plus pounds. And that was the best that industry and technology could do, in that time frame, for laser designation. Now we’ve gone through the development process, and we have a very robust, very accurate laser designation capability in a relatively small-sized ball that fits on a Shadow and weighs less than 50 pounds. So now it takes a 450-pound aircraft to carry that payload, where before it took a 1,600-pound aircraft. Then, when the FCS Class II and Class III UAS were terminated, one of the requirements of the Class II had been laser designation. So that was then made a requirement for the FCS Class I. Now, that’s going to be a big technologic step forward, but we are very close to the payload community, and there are designs in place and work being done on an FCS Class I to incorporate laser designation capability in that sized aircraft [Total Class I system weight, which includes the air vehicle, a control device, and ground support equipment is less than
51 pounds].”
Reid continued, “So we saw this trend coming and felt, as Shadow moves on to do more sophisticated missions—laser designation, weaponization, things like that—what about the original role for Shadow: the standard EO/IR platform that potentially grows into laser designation when the capability is there? So we felt that we really needed a smaller class UAS, because generally size equates to life cycle costs. And with that we think we could offer essentially the same capabilities that Shadow did, early in its life, with a smaller sized platform. It won’t hurt Shadow, because Shadow is going to continue to become more sophisticated and do roles that, quite frankly, Hunters used to do.”
Although the 2005-2006 time frame saw some discussion of a smaller Shadow 100 concept, the needs to continually enhance Shadow 200 support to warfighters led AAI (prior to its own acquisition by Textron) to explore a possible UAS acquisition in that smaller class. A global search led to identification of a small Australian company,
Aerosonde, which AAI acquired in June 2006. Reid noted that the accompanying Aerosonde product line had been designed to support university and scientific missions by carrying university or scientific payloads into dull, dirty or dangerous
areas.”So we said, ‘Let’s acquire this company and then let’s take that product and militarize it, because it’s got what it takes,” he said. Subsequent company efforts focused on increasing robustness of the platform, developing a couple of new generations of platforms, and then taking the most recent of those—the Mark 4.7—and integrating much of the ground control elements that support the Shadow.
“Along the same lines, we know how important the expeditionary nature of our products is,” Reid noted. “When we won the Shadow program in 1999, we were the smallest system of the seven competitors. In the [currently ongoing U.S. Marine Corps] StUAS Tier II competition we are also the smallest of the competitors. So we pack a big punch in a little package. “So we’ve been looking at whether or not Moore’s Law is going to play in this domain and how small we can get while still providing the very important capabilities that our customers are looking for,”
he added.
PUMA AE
Another recent representative example of getting small in this domain involves the AeroVironment Inc. Puma AE [All Environment]. In July 2008, the company announced USSOCOM’s selection of Puma AE as its all environment capable variant (AECV) solution to the small unmanned aircraft system (UAS) requirement. According to the announcement, “The hand-launched Puma AE lands near-vertically on both land and water and is equipped with a day- and night-capable, waterproof sensor package that provides image tracking, image stabilization and high-image quality. Puma AE systems incorporate the same handheld ground control unit used by U.S. Department of Defense and allied military customers to control Raven and Wasp systems. Ship-based use of Puma AE requires no modification to naval vessels, enabling easy integration into maritime operations. The AECV program represents the fourth DoD full and open competition for a small UAS program of record, and the fourth such competition won by AV.” “AV responded to a USSOCOM requirement for a hand-launched UAS. We are pleased to be chosen to deliver these capabilities into the hands of warfighters with a new, more capable third generation version of our Puma,” said John Grabowsky, AV executive vice president and general manager of unmanned aircraft systems. “Puma AE joins Raven and Wasp in AV’s product portfolio, delivering a powerful new solution for land and ship-based, over-the horizon intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.” U.S. armed forces including the Army, Marine Corps, Air Force and USSOCOM, as well as other international forces, use AV’s hand-launched UAS for missions that include base security, route reconnaissance, mission planning, battle damage assessment and force protection.
As noted earlier, these programs represent just a few representative examples of the myriad platform programs flying in “locally deployed” tactical scenarios. However, they clearly exhibit many of the ongoing technology trends in this platform arena. As technology advances continue to place greater and greater tactical capabilities on smaller and smaller platforms, the resulting benefits for warfighters on the ground will only continue to expand the potential applications of unmanned aerial systems in modern military operations. ♦