Fire Scout test aimed at USCG

From Aviation Week

Fire Scout Test Aimed At Coast Guard

Sep 25, 2008

By Graham Warwick/Aerospace Daily & Defense Report

The first flight of an MQ-8B Fire Scout with multimode maritime radar has removed a major obstacle to U.S. Coast Guard interest in the shipborne vertical-takeoff-and-landing unmanned air vehicle (VUAV), manufacturer Northrop Grumman believes.

The off-the-shelf Telephonics RDR-1700B imaging surveillance radar completed a functional check flight on Northrop’s company-owned Fire Scout, aircraft P6, on Sept. 19 at Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona (Aerospace DAILY, Sept. 23). The radar has since been removed to allow testing of another payload, but the company plans to reinstall the sensor in October for overwater flight-tests from Webster Field in Maryland or Wallops Island on the Virginia coast, says Mike Fuqua, Fire Scout business development manager.

Fuqua says the Coast Guard has made clear its interest in the Fire Scout, for operation from its new National Security Cutter (NSC), but stipulated its requirement for an integrated radar. The U.S. Navy plans to begin developing a radar for the MQ-8B in fiscal 2009, for fielding in 2011, but Northrop used its own money to integrate the nondevelopmental RDR-1700B on the Fire Scout to demonstrate the capability, he says.

The Coast Guard and Navy have held several meetings to discuss the Fire Scout, Fuqua says. But the Coast Guard is also moving ahead with plans to form a joint program office with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to coordinate the use of maritime UAVs. CBP’s Air & Marine division is promoting the use of its land-based General Atomics Predator Bs for maritime surveillance.

Organic ISR

Northrop believes the Coast Guard will want an organic intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capability for the NSC, to allow operations out of range of land-based UAVs. Under its Deepwater modernization program, the Coast Guard originally selected the Bell Eagle Eye tiltrotor UAV over the Fire Scout, but the Eagle Eye program was canceled in 2007.

“We’re pretty sure the Coast Guard will demand maritime-based ISR, and look for the most mature, reliable and capable VUAV,” Fuqua says. “We think the Fire Scout is viable for the NSC,” he says, noting the new cutter has space for a UAV ground control system designed into its combat information center.

The Coast Guard is expected to demand integration on the VUAV of the automatic identification system (AIS), to track transponder-equipped shipping, but this is a capability the Navy also wants for its radar-equipped Fire Scout, Fuqua says.

P6 is being prepared for flight-testing of the ASTAMIDS multispectral mine detection payload planned for the U.S. Army’s Fire Scouts, but once those are complete the radar will be reinstalled, Fuqua says. Following overwater test flights, Northrop plans to conduct a capability demonstration for the Coast Guard and Navy, although the timing has not been determined.