Unmanned, but Well Supported

Written by Henry Canady

MLF 2010 Volume: 4 Issue: 7 (August)

The Number Of Unmanned Platforms
Deployed Grows Monthly, As Does The
Support Requirement To Keep Them Flying.

Unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) are increasing in number, types and capabilities. Sustainment in the field is simpler than for manned types, per aircraft. But there are challenges due to sheer numbers and forward locations. Moreover, many firms manufacture UASs, some of which may not have the desire and resources to support them.

The U.S. Army alone has a thousand UASs in Iraq and Afghanistan. The number of aircraft is larger. A single UAS includes two RQ-7 Shadows. Three RQ-11B Ravens make up one UAS, as do four MQ-5B Hunters. Twelve Extended Range Multi-Purpose (ERMP) unmanned aircraft will be in each system.

“We have seen an explosion in use of UASs,” said Colonel Gregory Gonzalez, project manager for the Army UAS.

The Army generally supports UASs with contractor logistics support (CLS) contracts. Soldiers in squads or platoons remove parts on the small Raven and send these to forward bases. For the larger Shadow, brigade combat teams do some maintenance while field service representatives (FSRs) do repairs under a performance based logistics (PBL) contract.

“Without that PBL, we could not have reacted as fast as we did in Iraq,” Smith said. Originally intended to provide 12 hours per day of continuous surveillance, Shadows now yield 24 hours, seven days a week. Availability is at 97 percent. Depot maintenance is done by manufacturer AAI, which has public-private partnerships (PPPs) with Tobyhanna and Letterkenny Army Depots for repair of ground stations and other infrastructure.

Support of the new ERMP is still handled by General Atomics, but the Army has begun training operators and mechanics at its Unmanned Systems Training Base at Fort Huachuca, Ariz. “As we move forward, you will see soldiers doing more maintenance and replacing more line replaceable units [LRUs] on the ERMP,” Gonzalez said.

Logistics Chief Ron Smith expects that a PBL will be used on the ERMP, and that by 2012 General Atomics will form a PPP with Corpus Christi. Another Army UAS, the Hunter, is supported under CLS by Northrop Grumman. Ravens appear unsuitable for PBL treatment. Gonzalez is evaluating the use of condition based maintenance (CBM) for the Shadow. If cost-effective, it could be applied to the Shadow and then possibly extended to the ERMP.

So far, CLSs and PBLs have been done with manufacturers, but the Army would like eventually to get more competition. Yet cost reduction has been achieved. Early support of Shadows cost 10 percent of acquisition cost annually. That has been reduced to 4.7 percent.

The Navy has four UAS program offices: PMA 262 is developing UASs for broad area maritime surveillance; PMA 263 acquires small tactical UASs; PMA 266 manages vertical takeoff & landing tactical UASs; and PMA 268 is demonstrating unmanned combat air systems.

Maintenance of MQ-8 Fire Scouts is primarily organic and depot, according to Captain Tim Dunigan of PMA 266. Afloat it will be maintained by Composite Aviation Detachments composed of MH-60 Seahawk and MQ-8 operators and maintainers. Ashore it will be maintained by CLS. Supplies are managed by Naval Supply in Philadelphia. Training is performed by Northrop Grumman, but will be taken over by the Navy. Program offices will conduct business case analyses to determine whether PBLs should be used on Navy UASs.

The Air Force operates the Predator, MQ-9 Reaper, RQ-4 Global Hawk and Wasp III. It generally uses government systems to manage parts, but some are managed and maintained by contractors, for example targeting sensor balls on Predators and Reapers.

Field-level repairs may be done by the Air Force or industry, but most depot work is done by contractors. Most logistics is also accomplished by companies under CLS. Several UAS offices are doing BCAs to determine whether to move sustainment responsibilities to the government.

Air Force mechanics get fundamental training at Sheppard Air Force Base and are given training for specific systems by a field-training detachment. The service is studying some changes in this procedure.

Northrop Grumman makes the Hunter, the Global Hawk, the Fire Scout and the new Bat. It will produce the Long Endurance Multi- Intelligence Vehicle (LEMV).

A total of 52 Hunters fly for the Army. J.D. Moss, manager of Northrop’s UAS support center, estimates 48 are deployed. “There are 45 different payloads that can be put in; it is by far the most utilized.”

Northrop has two government-owned/contractor-operated (GOCO) teams that operate and maintain Hunters. Other deployed Hunters are maintained by Army units, with Northrop providing small teams of experts onsite. The supply chain is managed by the Army.

Depot maintenance of Hunters is done by Northrop at Sierra Vista, Ariz., after rotation back from 18-month deployments. Northrop employees overhaul most of the Hunter, but some components are sent to their manufacturers.

Northrop trains its CLS and GOCO staff at the Army’s Dugway Proving Ground, near Salt Lake City, and provides training materials for the Army, which trains soldiers at Fort Huachuca.

The sustainment of Hunters is “not a pure PBL, but about 50 percent performance based,” Moss explains. “We have metrics, reliability and flight-hour numbers we must maintain.” Metrics are measured across the entire fleet, whether supported by GOCO or the Army. PPPs have been discussed but not implemented, partly due to the small fleet.

Sustainment of other Northrop UASs is similar, but without GOCO teams. The company provides CLS teams for Air Force Global Hawks and FSRs for Navy Fire Scouts. Bat’s very new, and the LEMV contract was recently awarded.

Moss expects more UASs to be operated and capabilities to expand. Moreover, the services will seek even better support. “They will want easier sustainment built in from the get go.”

Battlespace Flight Services provides organic support for General Atomics’ Predator under a five-year contract whose fifth option year begins in October. The contract is firm fixed-price for continental United States and cost-plus award fee, based on semiannual reviews of performance, for Iraq and Afghanistan. CEO Charlie Moore said Battlespace provides the vast majority of organic support, but the Air Force does some in the field, and General Atomics does depot overhauls.

Battlespace supports Predators for Air Force Combat Command at Creech Air Force Base, Indian Springs, Nev., and Air Force Special Operations Command at Cannon Air Force Base, Clovis, N.M., as well as four sites in Iraq and Afghanistan. Supply chain management is done by the Air Force. The company’s work force of 385 is evenly split among the U.S. sites, war zones and those resting after four-month rotations from the field. Battlespace trains its own mechanics, who have five years of previous aviation maintenance experience. The Air Force trains its personnel, who operate all Predators.

The toughest challenges are making sure preventive maintenance is done correctly, overhauling engines and maintaining payloads, according to Moore. Battlespace pulls and replaces Predator engines every 60 hours. The aircraft are pulled into depot only at the end of service lives, but General Atomics sends reps to do depot-level repairs in the field. “It is a very modular aircraft, everything is plug-and-play,” Moore noted.

“We are actively engaged with other manufacturers about partnering for support of their UASs,” Moore said. “This field is growing dramatically, there are a number of small manufacturers that just want to make UASs, not service them.”

AAI makes the Shadow, while an Australian subsidiary makes the Aerosonde Mark 4.7. Randy Pilling, vice president of tactical UASs, noted that Shadows are operated by both the Army and Marine Corps. AAI provides depot repairs, supply chain management, transportation, FSRs for both services’ Shadows under a contract administered by the Army. Except for GOCO teams that work with a small percent of Shadows, military personnel do organic maintenance with the help of AAI FSRs.

“It is a pretty all-encompassing contract,” Pilling said. AAI is incented by four metrics: system readiness, reliability growth, depotlevel downtime and speedy execution of field modifications.

Pilling said his main challenge is balancing the need to maintain high levels of reliability for aggressive flying schedules with the need to make modifications quickly. But he can draw flexibly on a common supply chain to serve the needs of different units and even different services. AAI is encouraged to use military transport systems, which can be tight, but so far has been able to make this system work.

Although the military trains its Shadow staff at Fort Huachuca, AAI may give them additional training on new equipment. The firm trains its own FSRs for 15 to 17 weeks, then does practical training at Dugway.

Depot repairs on the Shadow aircraft are done by AAI at Hunt Valley, Md., usually within six months after return from the field. Heavy overhauls of ground stations and other equipment is done through PPPs with two Army Depots. “They are very proficient,” Pilling remarked.

Support for Shadows sold to non-U.S. operators and for the Aerosonde is similar to that for the Shadow, but tailored to the needs of each customer.

Pilling believes UAS sustainment will become more predictable in the future, due to better technology. But he says the increasing capabilities of UASs will demand more broadly skilled mechanics. AAI is interested in providing sustainment for UASs that it does not make, and may have an advantage here. Its ground station can support multiple UASs, including the Hunter.

Insitu, a Boeing company, makes the ScanEagle and NightEagle and will soon field the Integrator. Frank Gilligan, director of integrated logistics support, said his firm provides logistic support packages, manages the supply chain, does depot repairs and much of field-level repairs as well as training maintenance and operation staff.

In some cases, Insitu personnel also operate the aircraft. The exact support provided differs by location and customer, as the two Eagles are operated by the U.S. Army, Marines, Navy and Coast Guard, as well as by Canadian and Australian forces. Contract types also vary widely according to the needs and practices of each customer.

About 400 of 700 Insitu’s employees are involved in this sustainment effort. Gilligan said maintenance challenges are ones common to most UASs, but the modularity of ScanEagle and NightEagle design makes logistics and repairs easier. With experience gained from more than 335,000 operational flight hours, Gilligan believes Insitu is well qualified to offer support to other UASs, both Boeing products and those made by other manufacturers.

AeroVironment has delivered more than 15,000 of its small unmanned aircraft, the RQ-14 Dragon Eye, the RQ-11B Raven, Puma AE and Wasp, to all four U.S. services, the Special Operations Command and allied military forces. A much larger type, the Global Observer, is now undergoing tests. Spares, repairs and upgrades are generally provided for operating aircraft under CLS, said Dan Stone, vice president UAS logistics operation. He expects that the same sort of arrangement will be followed when the Global Observer is deployed.

The Raven, Puma and Wasp all use the same ground system, and both aircraft and system can be carried in the field in a soldier’s backpack. Soldiers can rapidly swap out failed or doubtful LRUs, which are exchanged with replacements stored at forward bases operated by AeroVironment field reps. Some LRUs can be repaired at these bases, while others needing heavier work are sent for depot repairs at the company’s headquarters in Simi Valley, Calif. AeroVironment does almost all these depot repairs, except for some sensors and cameras. AeroVironment trains military personnel on operating its aircraft, including exploiting aircraft capabilities and doing field-level tests and swap-outs. The course takes only two weeks and 5,000 military personnel have been trained so far.

The overall approach seems to be working. Army units report mission-availability rates “in the high 90s,” according to Stone. He said the services have been looking at switching to PBL contracts, but no decision has been reached yet. Meanwhile, the company has been embedding more of its own people with the units actually operating the aircraft. “That appears to be proving of value,” Stone said. And AeroVironment has begun to look at the possibilities of supporting other manufacturers’ UASs. “I don’t think we would turn down an opportunity to be involved.” ♦

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