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Thursday, January 19, 2006

Fire Scout UAV Performs Automated At-Sea Tests

The first fully automated landings of the Fire Scout unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) aboard a moving ship took place Jan. 16 and 17, according to Northrop Grumman.

Two RQ-8A Fire Scouts flying from Naval Air Station Patuxent, Md., carried out nine landings and takeoffs from the amphibious transport dock Nashville while the ship was steaming in the lower Chesapeake Bay.

Earlier shipboard tests were manually controlled, said Tim Paynter, a spokesman for Northrop Grumman Integrated Systems, El Segundo, Calif.

Northrop is developing the Fire Scout for the U.S. Navy and Army. Twelve MQ-8B Fire Scouts — an improved model with a four-blade rotor replacing the three-blade rotor of the RQ-8A — are being built, four for the Navy and eight for the Army. Northrop is assembling the aircraft at its plant in Moss Point, Miss., from airframes built by Schweizer Aircraft at Horseheads, N.Y. Schweizer delivered the first airframe on Jan. 3.

The first shipboard tests of the MQ-8B are scheduled for 2007.

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