Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) recently conducted an initial flight test of a Marine Corps UH-1Y Venom helicopter transmitting data from the Mobile User Objective System (MUOS) satellite communications capability for integration with the MQ-25A Stingray unmanned tanker.
The Lockheed Martin [LMT]-developed MUOS is a satellite communications system that provides next-generation narrowband connectivity to military networks around the world. The Navy said the next generation of MUOS will work much faster with more payloads that support new waveform capabilities and compatibility with the legacy UHF satellite communications systems.
This test occurred on April 26 at NAVAIR’s facility at Patuxent River, Md., with the Dedicated Unmanned Carrier Aviation (UCA) Development Environment (DUDE) lab at Webster Outlying Field in St. Inigoes, Md., and the Communications Systems Integration Laboratory (CSIL) at Pax River. Both labs transmitted data from the helicopter using unique test equipment installed on it that proved “MUOS connectivity, resilience, and viability using a maneuvering aircraft,” the Navy said.
“Testing MUOS with H-1 will facilitate the MQ-25 test infrastructure development and ensure MUOS connectivity configuration. It also provides an opportunity for the [Unmanned Carrier Aviation program office, PMA-268] program team to observe MUOS flight characteristics,” Ray Belcher, MQ-25 Integrated Test Team communications lead, said in a statement.
Capt. Daniel Fucito, program manager of PMA-268, said this kind of testing showed how two “very different” programs can work together.
This is not the first time the service tested UH-1Y helicopters with unmanned systems.
Last year, the Navy and Marine Corps used UH-1Y and AH-1Z Viper helicopters in a manned-unmanned teaming exercise alongside an MQ-8C Fire Scout unmanned helicopter aiding in target decision and strike coordination (Defense Daily, March 16, 2022).
The MQ-25 is set to be the Navy’s first carrier-based unmanned aircraft devoted to aerial refueling and have some intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities.
Last month, a Navy official said the initial operational capability for the MQ-25A was pushed back a year to 2026 due to some production maturity challenges (Defense Daily, April 13).
Boeing [BA] is the prime contractor for the Stingray. It won an initial $805 million engineering and manufacturing development contract in 2018 covering the design, development, building, testing and verification of the first four MQ-25s (Defense Daily, Aug. 30, 2018).
The Navy plans to eventually procure 76 total MQ-25s, including three system demonstration test articles and four engineering development models
In 2018, Textron [TXT] delivered the last of 160 Bell UH-1Y Venom helicopters to the Marine Corps.