News - U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2

U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2

http://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism...2-030641-7016r

By PAMELA HESS
UPI Pentagon Correspondent

WASHINGTON, Oct. 12 (UPI) -- The civilian chief of the U.S. Air Force
says the retirement of the storied U-2 spy plane is on hold until the
Global Hawk unmanned reconnaissance aircraft can be an effective
substitute.

The Air Force in late December 2005 got permission to retire the fleet
of 33 U-2 "Dragonlady" spy planes by 2011. The retirement would save
the Air Force about $1 billion, money that would be redirected into the
Global Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle built by Northrop Grumman.

The problem is the Global Hawk, as currently configured, can't do
everything for which combatant commanders have come to rely on the U-2.

"Right now the U-2, in fact, collects some material that the current
Global Hawk can't. So I've been asked to slow that down and prove to
the combatant commanders that we intend to do that. I think it's going
to take us a little time but, frankly, it was -- it was a mission area
that we felt like had -- would diminish a little bit faster than the
combatant commanders thought it would diminish," said Michael Wynne, in
an interview on C-SPAN's "Newsmakers" slated to air Oct. 15.

The U-2 is a temperamental plane that pilots fly at the edge of the
space to take wide area pictures of regions over which other aircraft
cannot fly. But that extreme environment limits how long and how often
pilots can fly the aircraft.

Wynne said the Air Force is looking for ways to extend the time in the
cockpit, or automate the U-2.

"One of the things that we find and we're finding is we're actually
constrained on the human side. When we put a U-2 up, the airplane can
outlast the pilot," Wynne said. "We're doing a lot of work to try to
figure out how to use the pilot longer in that situation or to do away
with the pilot when we want the observance or the reconnaissance to go
longer than we had expected."

According to briefing charts compiled by an airborne reconnaissance
office in the Air Force, the Global Hawk does not provide the broad
area synoptic imagery of the U-2 -- that is, a static shot of an
enormous area, the dimensions of which are classified. Such imagery is
used both for treaty verification and also in preparation for battles;
a single shot can show how an entire enemy force is arrayed on the
battlefield. Follow up shots can then track movements. Satellites do
not provide those broad pictures but rather create less accurate
"mosaics" through smaller area pictures taken over different times that
must then be pieced together.

The Air Force's original plans called for the Global Hawk -- the
capabilities of which are still being developed -- to replace the U-2
in three stages, starting in Korea in 2007, then Cyprus and then the
Middle East. The same charts showed a degradation in intelligence
support to each of the supported combatant commanders if the switch
were made. According to the charts, the broad area synoptic imagery,
synthetic aperture radar, electro-optical and infrared capabilities of
Global Hawk would fall short of the U-2 at least through 2012 in every
area.

The Global Hawk is being upgraded with a new, larger airframe to carry
a heavier payload to bring it more in line with U-2 capabilities,
including a signals intelligence and imagery suite. However, it will
not be flight tested until 2007.

The Congressional Research Service reported the U-2 fleet should be
capable of flying until 2050 because of engine and cockpit upgrades
done in the last 10 years.

"Right now ... the replacement to the U-2 is a little bit on hold until
we can get the Global Hawk group to where the Global Hawk can be, if
you will, an effective substitute. And we have to prove that to the
combatant commanders," Wynne said.

Congress prohibited the retirement of any U-2s in the fiscal year 2007
defense authorization report until the Defense Department certifies
that support to the warfighter will not be degraded.

That language was written into the bill in April, when the Pentagon
reported to Congress that the Global Hawk was more than 25 percent over
budget. In March, the Government Accountability Office reported that
the program has experienced 166 percent cost growth over the projected
costs in 2001. The Defense Department has spent more than $6 billion on
the program since its inception a decade ago.

Rusty wrote:

U.S. Air Force considers pilotless U-2


There was a plan to make a drone version of the SR-71 at one time also.
I've got a pin of a SR-71 sans cockpit windows or bulge.
Looks damn slick like that with the smooth nose lines.

Pat

On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 01:30:51 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:

There was a plan to make a drone version of the SR-71 at one time also.

....Cite source on this one, Patrick. I recall the D-21 drone
*carrier*, but not a Mach 3+ drone version of the Habu.

OM
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