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Lockheed unveils longer-endurance Fury UAV
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WASHINGTON DC
Source: Flightglobal.com
18:57 20 Feb 2015

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has tweaked the design of the flying wing-shaped Fury unmanned air vehicle (UAV) as it pursues contracts from US special operations forces and the international market.

The Block 10 update of the five-year-old Fury design adds a wider-chord and longer-span airfoil to increase endurance, especially when flying at low speeds, says Jay McConville, a Lockheed business development director.

The centre wingbox of the 136kg (300lb)-class UAS also is tweaked to make it easier integrate new and heavier sensors, he says, along with more reliable components.

The Fury was originally launched in 2010 by a start-up company called AeroMech, which had designed the Desert Hawk UAS on behalf of Lockheed. AeroMech was later acquired by Chandler/May, which, in turn, was acquired by Lockheed.

In the specrum of UAS capabilities, the Fury falls between the tactical Insitu RQ-21 Blackjack and the brigade-level

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. It is initially proposed as a surveillance asset for special operations, which is preparing to release a draft solicitation for the mid-endurance UAS programme.

“We think Fury would bring a great capability to that customer set,” McConville says.

Since the acquisition, Lockheed has unveiled two major performance upgrade. The first design added a beyond line of sight communications antenna, allowing the aircraft to communicate with a ground control station to take advantage of its claimed 15h endurance.

So far, the Fury has not been sold to foreign customers, but Lockheed believes the design is exportable.

“We have export marketing licenses for a variety of customers around the world,” McConville says.

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Naval Today said:

Anaren, Inc. announced that it has delivered its first production units of a passive beamforming network to Raytheon Integrated Defense Systems in support of the U.S. Navy’s next-generation Air and Missile Defense Radar (AMDR).

The delivery of this hardware is a key milestone in the initial Engineering and Manufacturing Development (E&MD) contract.

Raytheon awarded the subcontract to Anaren in March of 2014, which extends through March, 2015 and is part of the larger Low Rate Initial Production (LRIP) subcontract potentially worth up to $110 million over ten years.

Following the completion of LRIP, full-scale production will commence and is expected to last for roughly 20 years.

AMDR is the U.S. Navy’s next generation integrated air and missile defense radar planned for the DDG 51 Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyers.

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FORBIN said:

What is it exactly ?

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Skywatcher said:

It's a modified Boeing 737 with radars for gauging the RCS figures of stealth aircraft, IIRC.

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The Marine Corps will temporarily "pause" its drawdown in 2016 in order to assess the impact the policy has had on small unit leaders following years high operational tempo.

Pentagon officials plan to keep the Marine Corps at 184,000 strong through the next fiscal year, according to the 2016 defense budget request, released Monday. Barring another round of across the board spending cuts, the service will not drop below 182,000 Marines, according to the document.

The budget, which deals the Corps with $24 billion — plus another $1.3 billion for overseas contingency funding — sets aside enough money to keep 184,000 Marines on payroll through September 2016. It'll then drop down to 182,000 in fiscal 2017.

The pause will reduce deployment-to-dwell rations as Marines are called on to fulfill a slew of missions around the world, including contributing to the fight against the Islamic State group, manning two new land-based crisis response units for Africa and the Middle East, and carrying out the service's pivot to the Asia-Pacific region.

Up until recent months, the Corps was preparing to shed an additional 8,000 Marines. Coupled with budget limitations mandated by sequestration, the drawdown was expected to leave the Corps with just 174,000 Marines by 2017.

But as recently as a few months ago, Marine officials quietly revised those numbers, saying the Corps would hold fast at 182,000.

According to budget documents, the pause also allows officials to assess the "impact of the four year drawdown on small unit leaders in the face of a continued high operational tempo." Commandant Gen. Joseph Dunford highlighted what he described as a shortage of noncommissioned officers in key positions as an area needing addressing in his recently released planning guidelines.

Though this year's budget represents a $1.5 billion increase for the Corps, combined with significant cuts to the overseas contingency funding given the end to the war in Afghanistan, it comes out to a roughly $400 million boost over fiscal 2015, said Capt. Tyler Balzer, a Marine Corps spokesman.

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Raytheon's 155mm M982 Excalibur extended-range guided artillery shell is being shrunk down to fit into the Mark 45 five inch deck guns that are deployed aboard the Navy's Cruisers and Destroyers. This miniaturized sea-going Excalibur, known as the N5, could triple the range of current five inch shells and offer pinpoint 'danger close' fire support like never before.

The Excalibur round really is a modern marvel. It can be hurtled out of a howitzer barrel under immense G loads, then once it reaches the top of its trajectory, it begins its guided glide path via pop-out canard control fins, which greatly enhances the shell's range over a standard 155mm round. Because it is guided, it can also hit nearly any target at near vertical angles, allowing it to strike the enemy in the shadow of steep mountains or in urban environments that traditional ballistic artillery could not engage safely.

The outer edge of the current Excalibur's range is said to be about 25 miles and

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. Guiding itself to its target using a sensitive and greatly miniaturized

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, Excalibur is so accurate that it has been cleared to be employed against targets just 500 feet from friendly forces.

Introduced onto the battlefield in Iraq in 2007, the rounds gave Howitzer units so much added flexibility due to the Excalibur's increased range, non-ballistic trajectory and almost perfect accuracy that the Army immediately upped the round's production from 18 units a month to 150. Since then, thousands more M982 shells have been built and nearly a thousand of them have been fired in combat.

Today, the updated version of Excalibur costs about $50k a shell and the price has steadily decreased over time, even though the project has been a victim of the DoD's spastic spending practices. Considering that Excalibur gives standard artillery units a ring of 25 miles around them in which they can deliver an attack with the same precision as munition dropped or fired from combat aircraft, $50k a round is really not such a bad deal. Especially when you consider that using a fixed-wing aircraft to deliver a similar effect costs a minimum of about $20k an hour.

It seems everything is relative in the world of

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and their five digit or greater price tags.

In a similar fashion to how the Excalibur gave Army and Marine artillery units a massive upgrade in range, accuracy and tactical flexibility, Raytheon is looking to do the same with the Navy's prolific five inch Mk45 deck gun. According to the manufacturer, with a smaller diameter non-spinning base and a smaller warhead, the Mk45's current range using standard shells, about 13 miles (the Mk45 mod 4, with its longer barrel offers a range of about 21 miles), can be tripled. This would give Excalibur N5 paired with the Mk45 deck gun a range of almost 40 miles, and possibly 60 miles when fired from the Mark 45 Mod 4 gun equipped ships.

This means that a cruiser or destroyer could provide precision fires, even against targets located in dense urban areas, well over the horizon in support of shoreline operations, or deep into the enemy's territory if operating closer to shore in lower threat environments. Such a capability could be very useful when it comes to the concept of a classic Marine beach landing, but even more useful when used in support

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Time sensitive strike, the ability to hit a target within about an hours time is something the DoD is lusting for in the

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, but for places like the Horn of Africa, a single destroyer could sit off the coast of major population centers and wait for commands to strike targets of opportunity with Excalibur N5 shells in mere minutes.

During the Libyan conflict, America fired off well over 150 Tomahawk Cruise Missiles, each costing over a million dollars. Many of the Tomahawks' targets were based along Libya's shoreline, such as SAM sites and air defense radars. These could have been taken out by Navy ships 50 miles off shore at $50k a pop using the ship's main gun and long-range precision projectiles if they were available, not to mention being able to hit smaller targets in dense areas that the Tomahawk's 1,000 pound class warhead was simply too destructive for.

Raytheon is already working on a laser guided version of the Excalibur which will be able to hit moving targets designated by troops on the ground or by unmanned or manned aircraft overhead. This opens up a whole new potential for naval fire support. The idea that a cruiser operating some fifty miles out to sea, having the ability to take out a single vehicle in a convoy or a small group of fighters walking down a street, with very little chance of unintended casualties, is game changing. Paired with unmanned aircraft, such as the Navy's MQ-8 Fire Scout, such a concept would allow for a ship to literally provide fire support for friendly forces while 'on the run,' not to mention taking out mobile high value targets in mere minutes after their initial detection.

The Excalibur N5 could also be utilized to a more lethal degree in roles that the Mark 45 gun system already fulfills, such as anti-air and anti-surface warfare. Eventually, the rounds could even be fitted with a millimeter wave radar or infrared seekers allowing for large barrages to be launched at small boat swarms long before they get within visual distance of the ship itself.

The reality is that the Navy has kicked around the five inch guided projectile idea for decades. Raytheon was supposed to supply basically the same thing as its Excalibur N5 to satisfy the Extended Range Guided Munition (ERGM) program that floundered for nearly a decade and a half, finally being cancelled in 2008. This was probably near-sighted in retrospect as the technology was just beginning to prove itself as a mature and reliable on the battlefield by the time ERGM was cut.

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Jura said:

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Raytheon's 155mm M982 Excalibur extended-range guided artillery shell is being shrunk down to fit into the Mark 45 five inch deck guns that are deployed aboard the Navy's Cruisers and Destroyers.

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Naval Today said:

The U.S. Navy conducted successful test flights Feb. 22 of two Trident II D5 Fleet Ballistic Missiles built by Lockheed Martin.

This brings the D5 missile’s record to 155 successful test flights since design completion in 1989, a 25-year-plus reliability record unmatched by any other large ballistic missile.

Mat Joyce, vice president of Fleet Ballistic Missile programs and deputy for Strategic & Missile Defense Systems, Lockheed Martin Space Systems, said:

These latest test flights demonstrate the reliability of the D5 missile and the readiness of the entire Trident Strategic Weapon System every minute of every day. The Navy program office, the submarine crews and the industry team never rest to ensure the safety, security and performance of this crucial deterrence system.”

The Navy launched the unarmed missiles in the Pacific Ocean from a submerged Ohio-class submarine. The missiles were converted into test configurations using kits produced by Lockheed Martin that contain range safety devices and flight telemetry instrumentation.

The Navy conducts a continuing series of operational system evaluation tests of the Trident Strategic Weapon System, which is the sea-based element of the nation’s nuclear deterrent triad, under the testing guidelines of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

First deployed in 1990, the D5 missile is aboard U.S. Navy Ohio-class and U.K. Royal Navy Vanguard-class submarines. The three-stage ballistic missile carries multiple independently targeted reentry bodies.

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