SOCom to mount Hellfire missiles on Hummingbird

U.S. Special Operations Command is planning to mount Hellfire missiles on, strengthen the skin of, and add redundant flight controls to prototype versions of the A160T Hummingbird UAV, said Army Maj. Scott Beal, SOCom Hummingbird program manager.

Hummingbird maker “Boeing is completing a design to mount Hellfires on the rotocraft’s stub wings at the beginning of January,” Beal said at the 2008 Army Aviation Association of America Unmanned Aircraft Symposium in Arlington, Va.

SOCom is testing seven prototypes purchased in 2005 as part of a technology demonstration phase slated to continue through March. In August, officials tested the UAV’s ability to exchange data with One System Remote Video Terminal, Warfighter Information Network-Tactical, and Enhanced Position Location Reporting System, Beal said.

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