Tag: Dynamic Battle Management

Barone Consulting to provide technical support to DARPA Gremlins Program

DARPA has placed four companies on contract for the first phase of the Gremlins program, which will explore inexpensive unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in volley quantities to saturate enemy defenses. The Gremlins program will employ a modified C-130 aircraft to launch the UAVs, which will then communicate their behavior for electronic attack and reconnaissance missions from standoff ranges. Upon the completion of their mission they will then aerially recover surviving drones for refueling and reuse. The four companies will design UAVs that are inexpensive when compared to other autonomous weapon systems, so that occasional losses would not compromise the overall mission. The program aims to develop affordable UAVs that could be reused as many as 20 times for dangerous missions in contested air space such as pre-attack reconnaissance and surveillance, as well as electronic attack to destroy or disable enemy communications, missile defenses, and battlefield networks. These UAVs would be capable of employing diverse payloads in volley quantities, and would have the advantages of small vehicle size, reusability, and limited vehicle design life.

 

Barone Consulting is very proud and excited to be part of this groundbreaking effort, which promises to make a fundamental shift in the notion of aerial attack. SETA consultants from Barone Consulting will be advising the government program leadership on the proposed technical approaches of the four companies. Barone brings experience in unmanned aerial vehicles, airborne network management, autonomous agents and multi-agent systems. We will be advising program management on these areas as well and providing programmatic support for execution of the Phase 1 contracts.

The program is named in homage to the 1948 XF-85 Goblin aircraft, which was developed as a fighter capable of deploying from and recovering to a strategic bomber to provide escort counter air capabilities (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonnell_XF-85_Goblin). Ultimately the Goblin program was abandoned due to XF-85’s shortcomings against other fighter aircraft and the high degree of difficulty in reconnecting the fighter with its carrier/bomber aircraft. The Gremlins program recognizes the inherent difficulty with aerial recovery of an autonomous aircraft, but will capitalize on technological advances of the last 50 years. With that said, recovering an UAV from a C-130 in flight is still understood to be “DARPA Hard”.

 

DARPA is pursuing the Gremlins program in three phases: system and technology design; preliminary design; and prototype flight demonstration.

This first phase of the program is expected to spend about $15.8 million among the four separate contractors. Ultimately DARPA wants a Gremlins flight demonstration by early 2020 to show the feasibility and potential of air-launched, recoverable unmanned aircraft.

 

Barone Consulting is actively recruiting and encourages strong candidates with Top Secret security clearances, systems integration, flight test, and aeronautical engineering to contact us regarding DARPA opportunities.

Information about Barone Consulting can be found at www.baronedc.com

The original DARPA press release can be found at http://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2015-08-28.

 

About Barone Consulting

Founded in 2009, Barone Consulting provides system engineering and technical assistance services to the Department of Defense and the intelligence community. To find out more, please visit www.baronedc.com

 

Barone Consulting provides the experience critical to the success of DARPA’s Dynamic Battle Management program.

In February of 2014 the Strategic Technology Office within the Defense Advanced Research Program Agency decided to make a considerable investment to improve the DoD’s airborne battle management capability. Envisioned and managed by Dr. Craig Lawrence the program aimed to drastically improve the time critical situational awareness and decision-making tools utilized by Command and Control (C2) operators. To accomplish this the program, named “Dynamic Battle Management”, brought along the unique talents of Colonel Richard “Scotty” Wright (USAF Retired) from Barone Consulting to ensure they had a proper understanding of the challenges facing command and control operators.

All branches of the DoD have uniquely trained C2 operators. Key among them are the Air Battle Managers within the USAF who employ the E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) and the Naval Flight Officers of the US Navy’s E-2 Hawkeye fleet. These operators often describe their job as “performing air traffic control while people are shooting at each other”. Air Battle Managers and NFOs use a complex web of sensors, digital data links and voice radios to ensure the mission success of the US and coalition aircraft employed in military operations around the world. As C2 aircraft have modernized their sensors and data-links, their operators have become swarmed with the data available to them. The challenge of utilizing the data available form radar, air traffic control signals, and electronic warfare sensors on all networked aircraft is exactly what Dynamic Battle Management aims to solve.

DARPA has contracted with Lockheed Martin and Raytheon as key integrators for the program. They are developing mission planning, control, and situational understanding algorithms to enhance the C2 operator’s capabilities. Additionally they are researching the design of human-machine interfaces to make the operators more effective. Following this the Dynamic Battle Management team will build an integrated capability to manage air-to-air and air-to-ground combat and demonstrate that capability in large-scale simulation and live fly events. Fortunately for the program, Barone Consulting was available to guide them with subject matter expertise on these critical missions and technologies.

Founded in 2009, Barone Consulting provides system engineering and technical assistance services to the Department of Defense and the intelligence community. They provide a cadre of elite subject matter experts to the government in support of game-changing, cutting edge technologies that help performers bridge the “valley of death” between R&D and fielded tactically relevant products. To find out more, please visit www.baronedc.com.