09 Jan 15. Global Hawks Set New Flight Record. The U.S. Air Force RQ-4 Global Hawk and other variants of Northrop Grumman Corporation’s High Altitude Long Endurance (HALE) Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) series continued to prove their value to U.S. government agencies by flying more intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) mission hours in one week than ever before. The UAS series flew 781 hours from Sept. 10-16. The Air Force’s RQ-4 Global Hawk flew 87 percent of the missions; the U.S. Navy’s Broad Area Maritime Surveillance- Demonstration (BAMS-D) aircraft and NASA’s Global Hawk hurricane research asset flew the rest. HALE’s far-reaching weekly record surpasses the company’s previous weekly flight record of 665 hours set in February. “There are at least two Global Hawks in the air at all times providing indispensable ISR information to those that need it,” said Mick Jaggers, Global Hawk UAS programme director, Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems. “The 2014 fiscal year was the most active yet for the Global Hawk, with a 40 percent year over year increase in flight hours.” Within weeks of the record, Northrop Grumman delivered two new RQ-4 Global Hawk aircraft to the Air Force. A wide area surveillance model arrived at Grand Forks Air Force Base, North Dakota, on Sept. 10 and Beale Air Force Base received a multi-INT model Oct. 3. The increases in flight hours and size of the fleet will give combatant commanders more ISR capabilities at a time when demand often outstrips aircraft availability. Manufactured at Northrop Grumman facilities in Moss Point, Mississippi, and Palmdale, these latest RQ-4 Global Hawk models complete a four aircraft buy by the Air Force and brings the Air Force’s total Global Hawk fleet to 33. In August, the Air Force signed an agreement requesting three more Global Hawks. Those aircraft are scheduled for delivery in 2016 and 2017. Northrop Grumman’s HALE UAS series have exceeded more than 130,000 total flight hours. An average of 75 percent of flight hours are in support of combat/operational missions. (Source: UAS VISION)
09 Jan 15. UAV Vision Opens Extra Production Capacity in Sydney. UAV Vision has announced the opening of an additional production facility located in Sydney, Australia. To manage the increase in production rate for the rapidly growing interest in UAV Vision products, an additional facility was required to satisfy current and future customer demand. Every detail has been well-thought-out in the setting up of the additional facility, this is to ensure that the quality and performance of products being shipped are of the same quality as if shipped from the original UAV Vision production facility located in Port Macquarie, Australia. The additional facility allows UAV Vision to rapidly respond to large orders of their flagship product, the CM100, as well as any customised solutions. The extra production capacity also increases the company’s ability to dedicate more resources to product development and implement capability enhancements at a faster rate than was previously possible. Resulting in a better product, built in a shorter time. CEO of UAV Vision, Michael Bailey, had the following to say: “The opening of an additional production facility highlights the maturity of the company and its products as well as its ability to compete on the global stage. The demand for our products has recently seen substantial growth which made the decision of opening an additional production facility reality. The recent release of our version 3 CM100 has been warmly welcomed by our current customers who are simply blown away by the capability and performance the gimbal can offer for its size and weight. This is not a relocation, but an addition to the UAV Vision family.” As the commercial markets for small UAS’s continue to grow at an exponential rate, UAV Vision is positioned as an established and highly capable company that can provide highly capable and feature-rich products in a small fo