The Integrator unmanned aerial vehicle has been cleared for low-rate production following the successful completion of the engineering and manufacturing development phase of the program, the Navy said Thursday.
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| The RQ-21 Integrator. Photo by Insitu |
The RQ-21A Integrators are being procured by Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) for the Marine Corps under the Small Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System (STUAS) program. The aircraft for carrying out intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions are built by Boeing [BA] subsidiary Insitu.
The NAVAIR program manager for STUAS, Marine Col. Jim Rector, said the rapid development, system engineering and testing of the air vehicle has been “superb” and the Integrator will give first hand ISR to commanders in the field.
“They will no longer be waiting for this level of intelligence from joint or higher headquarters, but these tactical commanders will have it organically at their level–land or sea,” he said. “The ability to ‘find, fix and then finish’ adversaries and threats has been greatly accelerated with the RQ-21A” multi-intelligence unmanned system, Rector said.
NAVAIR awarded Insitu the contract to develop the Integrator in 2010. The aircraft is a larger offshoot of Insitu’s venerable ScanEagle, but larger and capable of carrying bigger payloads. Earlier this year, the Integrator flew off an amphibious assault ship, marking its first flight at sea.
The Pentagon in its fiscal 2014 budget request released in April requested $66.7 million to procure 25 Integrators. The RQ-21 can fly at a radius of about 50 nautical miles from its operating center. It is launched on a catapult and recovered by snagging it with a vertical line via a wing hook.