Lt. Gen. George Flynn, the Marine Corps’ top requirements officer, told reporters Tuesday in Washington, D.C., that he expects the service to field an unmanned cargo helicopter next year to support troops in remote locations. The Corps last year awarded contracts to Boeing and a Kaman Aerospace-Lockheed Martin team to demonstrate their respective unmanned vehicles. Boeing successfully completed its A160T Hummingbird demo in March at the Army’s Dugway Proving Ground in Utah, while the Kaman-Lockheed team showed off its K-MAX there in early February. (See Expanding World of Unmanned Air from the Daily Report archives.)
While the Space Force is still making long-term plans to establish high-fidelity live and virtual test and training ranges in the coming years, officials say they're also working with operators to identify near-term gaps and quickly field capabilities to address them.
