Navy Arms, Upgrades Fire
Scout UAS
The Navy is adding weapons and a new maritime search radar to Fire Scout drone, a helicopter-like vertical take-off UAS now conducting tests aboard the Littoral Combat Ship, service officials said. The weapons being added to the Fire Scout are part of a program that fires laser-guided 2.75 inch, folding-fin rockets called Advanced Kill Precision Weapons System, or APKWS. Using laser guidance to paint and pinpoint targets for the Fire Scout, APKWS was able to conduct successful land-based test firings, said Capt. Patrick Smith, program manager for multi-mission tactical unmanned air systems. "We've demonstrated an ability to designate and shoot APKWS from Fire Scout. The next-step is ship based testing," Smith said. Ship testing, however, is on hold due to ship availability, Navy officials said. The live-fire testing for APKWS and Fire Scout took place at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, Calif. The Navy is considering having the Fire Scout MQ-8B fire APKWS rockets over the sea sometime in the future, he added. In fact, while over-the-sea APKWS testing is uncertain for the MQ-8B, the Navy is planning to test APKWS on its newer, larger variant of the Fire Scout, the MQ-8C, in 2015, service officials said. Meanwhile, a new radar, slated to deploy on the Fire Scout aboard the USS Fort Worth (LCS 3) in 2015, will greatly extend the intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, or ISR, range of the aircraft, Smith explained. The existing electro-optical and infrared cameras on the Fire Scout have a range of six-to-ten miles, whereas the new maritime radar will be able to find targets at ranges out to 80 nautical miles, Smith said.
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