Northrop Grumman Corp. Aerospace Systems
sector in San Diego is using the company’s Bat unmanned aircraft in the U.S. Air Force Sand Dragon B programme to defeat improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and other roadside bombs.
The Northrop Grumman Bat UAS is a rail-launched, net-recovered, runway-independent UAS shaped like a bat in flight. It has a 2-foot wingspan, has a 212-pound gross weight, and will be equipped with the Cobalt 190 from the FLIR Systems Inc. Government Systems segment in Arlington, Va., says Mark Gamache, the Sand Dragon B programme manager at Northrop Grumman Aerospace.
Northrop Grumman won a $26.2 million contract last week to develop and deploy the Sand Dragon B UAS with counter-IED capability. Awarding the contract on 12 Aug. were officials of the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. Northrop Grumman joins the Chandler May Inc. AME Unmanned Air Systems segment in San Luis Obispo, Calif., on the San Dragon IED-hunting UAV programme.
The Northrop Grumman Bat UAS entry in the Air force Sand Dragon B programme is a medium-altitude UAV that can be configured with different-sized fuel tanks and different sensor payloads. The Bat has a blended body design able to carry a 3.2-cubic-foot payload.
The Bat Northrop Grumman Bat UAS has two engine variants — a Hirth electronic fuel-injection engine, as well as a heavy fuel-variant, which runs on a version of JP-8 fuel, the most widely used fuel used by the U.S. military, Northrop Grumman officials say.