X-47B Featured on “CBS Sunday Morning”

This is an extract from David Martin’s full report on the future of UAS which aired on Sunday, on “CBS Sunday Morning” TV show.

Here he interviews Navy Capt. Jaime Engdahl, director of  the X-47B Project. “It is an autonomous vehicle so it’s flying itself … It’s a very unique aircraft,” Engdahl said.

Responding to a computer programme, the X-47B launched from a land-based catapult at a Navy test facility in Maryland. “The test went very well and it’s very significant because this is the first time we’re actually doing catapult shots with a vehicle with nobody in the cockpit,” Engdahl said.

The X-47B has already performed taxi tests aboard the USS Truman and will soon attempt the first unmanned take off and landing from an aircraft carrier. “We’re working the carrier schedules right now so sometime this spring or summer [the aircraft will take off and land on a carrier],” Engdahl said.

The Navy has not yet decided to arm the X-47B. It could be used for other missions such as surveillance and electronic jamming of enemy air defenses. But it could also be used to strike heavily defended targets without risking a pilot’s life. Engdahl said that it could one day carry weapons.

Putting armed UAS aboard an aircraft carrier would give the U.S. Navy the capability to launch unmanned strikes virtually any place in the world. “The biggest thing is that you don’t have to worry about permission from other countries to operate a vehicle from foreign airfields,” Engdahl said.

The X-47B is not scheduled to reach the fleet until 2017, but when it does, UAS warfare will go to a whole new level.

Source: CBS