photo courtesy: Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman and U.S. Navy have completed nine initial flight tests of the MQ-4C Triton unmanne...
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photo courtesy: Northrop Grumman |
During envelope expansion, the test team validates the aircraft's ability to operate at a range of altitudes, speeds and weights. The flights are taking place at the company's manufacturing facility in Palmdale, California.The Triton test team accomplished endurance flights up to 9.4-hours at altitudes up to 50,000 feet. The aircraft also performed doublets, a maneuver that tests the aircraft's ability to recover from small perturbations in its flight path caused by turbulence.
Triton carries a variety of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance sensor payloads that allow military commanders to gather high-resolution imagery, use radar to detect targets, and provide airborne communications and information-sharing capabilities to military units across long distances.
US Navy plans to field 68 Triton UAS and will be used with the manned Boeing P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft to conduct surveillance missions.
The MQ-4C Triton will be a forward deployed, land-based, autonomously operated system that provides a persistent maritime ISR capability using a multi-sensor mission payload (maritime radar, Electro-Optical/Infrared (EO/IR), Electronic Support Measures (ESM), Automatic Identification System (AIS) and basic communications relay).
The MQ-4C Triton air vehicle is based upon the United States Air Force (USAF) RQ-4B Global Hawk, while its sensors are based upon components of (or entire systems) already fielded in the DoD inventory. Along with the P-8A manned aircraft, the MQ-4C Triton is integral to US Navy’s Maritime Patrol and Reconnaissance Force (MPRF) Family of Systems (FoS) airborne ISR recapitalization strategy.
