Foxhunt Program Includes A Mix Of UAVs Operating Together
The U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory has awarded a
three-year, $9.8 million contract to Boeing to further develop and
demonstrate technologies that will enable multiple small unmanned
aerial vehicles to coordinate with each other, along
with a manned airborne control station to more safely and
effectively carry out intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance
missions.
The Foxhunt Multi-Small Unmanned Aerial System Cooperative
Control Demonstration will leverage Boeing's networked systems
expertise and technology advancements to directly support an
emerging and challenging U.S. Air Force need.
"The focus of the Foxhunt program is the airborne control of a
varied mix of unmanned aerial vehicles," said Patrick Stokes of
Boeing Research & Technology, the company's advanced, central
research, technology and innovation organization, who will manage
the research effort. "It's part of a grander vision outlined by the
Air Force Research Laboratory to include the air launch,
command-and-control and airborne recovery of unmanned aerial
systems - all from an airborne mothership."
Stokes said the unmanned aerial systems are intended to be an
extension of the manned mothership's sensor and weapon suites,
improving situational awareness and intelligence, as well as
surveillance and reconnaissance reach, allowing for safer stand-off
distances.
The team working on this effort includes researchers from the
Boeing Research & Technology and Boeing Test & Evaluation
groups of Boeing's Engineering, Operations & Technology
organization; Boeing Defense, Space & Security's Phantom Works
organization; and Insitu, a wholly owned independent Boeing
subsidiary. Jonathan How, a renowned researcher from the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the area of unmanned
aerial vehicle cooperative planning, also is on the team.
"This research project is a good fit within Boeing's overall
research-and-technology strategy," said Jim Paunicka, a Boeing
Technical Fellow and the program's principal investigator. "It
supports research and technology roadmaps in many Boeing programs,
helping to further the development of technologies involving
airborne communications and networking, unmanned aerial systems,
control station architecture, multi-mission planning, and
command-and-control."