Click here - to select or create a menu

Naval News

DSEI Japan 2023
  • News
  • Event News
    • SNA 2023
    • Euronaval 2022
    • Indo Pacific 2022
    • Sea Air Space 2022
    • DIMDEX 2022
  • Interviews
  • Videos
  • Advertising
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
Home» News»MQ-8C Fire Scout Completes First EABO Exercise
MQ-9 STOL
MQ-8C Fire Scout Completes First EABO Exercise
A MQ-8C Fire Scout lands at San Clemente Island from Point Mugu during exercise Resolute Hunter demonstrating its Expeditionary Advanced Base Operations (EABO) capability. (Credit: U.S. Navy)

MQ-8C Fire Scout Completes First EABO Exercise

Northrop Grumman Corporation’s MQ-8C Fire Scout, the U.S. Navy’s autonomous, runway-independent helicopter system, successfully completed operations under the Expeditionary Advance Base Operations (EABO) concept, providing persistent intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and targeting (ISR&T) capabilities.

Naval News Staff 18 Aug 2022

Northrop Grumman press release

“Fire Scout is the Navy’s only unmanned helicopter with the ability to deploy from a ship or land with ISR&T at the extended range required for future warfighting,” said Capt. Dennis Monagle, U.S. Navy. “The system is vital in expeditionary use for situational awareness and critical decision-making.”

MQ-8C Fire Scout was launched from the Vertical Take-Off and Landing Tactical Unmanned Air Vehicle Maintenance Detachment at Naval Base Ventura County in Point Mugu, California, simulating a ship-based departure. The Navy conducted a control system hand-off of the MQ-8C Fire Scout from Point Mugu to San Clemente Island, California, demonstrating the ship-to-shore transition capability of the platform in a maritime expeditionary environment.

With the Navy’s Portable Mission Control Station (MCS-P), the system was recovered and redeployed rapidly for operational flexibility. The portable MCS-P ground control station helps MQ-8C Fire Scout basing in austere locations on land, helipad operations in an advanced forward location, and logistics support from ship flight decks. With identical ship-based hardware, screen configuration and software, operations remain consistent across all ship classes.

“We are supporting MQ-8C deployments on littoral combat ships while assisting the Navy with Fire Scout mission expansion efforts to include operations from other surface ships and shore-based sites,” said Lance Eischeid, director, Fire Scout program, Northrop Grumman. “This EABO demonstration further proves the flexible utility of Fire Scout for expeditionary use from land and across multiple ship classes.”

Fire Scout continues Northrop Grumman’s 70-year heritage of designing, building, delivering and sustaining the world’s most capable unmanned aircraft system.

About MQ-8C Fire Scout

US Navy photo

The MQ-8C Fire Scout is the Navy’s next-generation autonomous helicopter. The MQ-8C Fire Scout’s airframe is based on the commercial Bell 407, a mature helicopter with more than 1,600 airframes produced and over 4.4 million flight hours. Combined with the maturity of Northrop Grumman’s autonomous systems architecture, Fire Scout meets customer requirements for ship-based and land-based autonomous systems.

It also has the ability to autonomously take off and land on any aviation-capable ship and from prepared and unprepared landing zones. This enhancement significantly increases range and endurance (more than double) and payload capacity (more than triple). The MQ-8C has completed developmental testing and is ready to deploy.

There are two Fire Scout variants. The smaller MQ-8B Fire Scout has deployed on multiple frigates and is currently deployed on a Littoral Combat Ship (LCS). MQ-8B Fire Scout has also deployed to Afghanistan to support counter-improvised explosive device (IED) operations. This system has completed more than 16,600 flight hours over 6,200 sorties.

The U.S. Navy has integrated a multi-mode maritime radar on MQ-8B and tested an onboard weapons capability, the Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System (APKWS). The MQ-8B Fire Scout has also demonstrated the ability to operate concurrently with other manned aircraft while operating at sea.

MQ-8C Northrop Grumman 2022-08-18
Tags MQ-8C Northrop Grumman
Facebook Twitter Stumble linkedin Pinterest More

Related Articles

Northop Grumman Tests Ultra-Lite Electronic Attack System

Northop Grumman Tests Ultra-Lite Electronic Attack System

Naval News Staff 12 Jan 2023
Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC) has successfully demonstrated key components of the company's future Ultra-Lite Electronic Attack (EA) Prototype System.
Northrop Grumman Completes 4th Successful Live Fire of AARGM-ER

Northrop Grumman Completes 4th Successful Live Fire of AARGM-ER

Naval News Staff 09 Dec 2022
Northrop Grumman has completed the fourth successful flight test of its AGM-88G AARGM-ER.
LITENING Targeting Pod Makes First US Navy Super Hornet Flight

LITENING Targeting Pod Makes First US Navy Super Hornet Flight

Naval News Staff 07 Sep 2022
Northrop Grumman’s LITENING advanced targeting pod has successfully completed its first test flights on the U.S. Navy’s F/A-18 Super Hornet.

Advertisement

Advertisement

Legal / Privacy Policy
About Us
Contact Us

Copyright © 2022 Naval News
All Rights Reserved
We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.Ok