UPDATED WASHINGTON: The Navy chalked up a big financial win for the MQ-8 Fire Scout program last month, setting the stage for a multimillion-dollar deal to buy a slew of new unmanned aircraft in the coming years. Congressional appropriators set aside $191 million for the Navy to buy 12 new, long-range variants of the helicopter-like… Keep reading →

Patuxent River, Md: The Navy has increased its experimentation with its fleet of combat helicopters to see how they can work with unmanned aircraft. The Navy recently flew Lockheed Martin’s new MH-60R Sea Hawk helicopter and the Northrop Grumman’s Fire Scout unmanned aircraft together in joint operations, deputy program manager Robert Kimble told reporters here… Keep reading →

Washington: The Navy will place arming its fleet of Fire Scout drones with a modified Hydra rocket, heralding a new era in unmanned combat for the service. An armed Fire Scout will dramatically cut the Navy’s kill chain, or time it takes to identify, track and eventually sink an enemy target, says Jan Van Tol,… Keep reading →

Washington: The program manager for the Navy’s Fire Scout rotary wing unmanned air system and the admiral responsible for UAVs rejected much of a highly critical review of the drone by the Pentagon’s top operational tester. The director of the Defense Operational Test and Evaluation office said all of the drone’s flights during training took… Keep reading →