AREA-I’s Air-Launched, Tube-Integrated, Unmanned System 600 (ALTIUS 600) and Raytheon’s Coyote drone will be among the drones in the swarm.
The swarm will
converge on a target area, use infrared sensors and electronic warfare payloads
to detect enemy forces, fix their positions, and feed information back to
networked ground troops.
According to Maj. Gen.
Walter Rugen of the army’s Future Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team,
spectators in the upcoming exercise will witness the “extensive use” of
electronic warfare and an interactive drone swarm.
“We’ll be launching
them pretty much, you know, Monster Garage-style, anyway we can,” he told The
War Zone. “Which again shows, in my mind, just the flexibility of our
air-launched effects initiatives, because we can launch it from the air, we can
launch it from the ground, and we can launch from fixed-wing, rotary-wing, any
type of ground vehicle.”
Rugen explained that
previous small drone swarm trials inspired the decision to test a swarm of up
to 30 drones.
The swarm will scan
vast terrain autonomously, sending video and targeting data to manned
platforms.
The drones will be
passive or active, with electro-optical or infrared imaging cameras, electronic
jamming equipment, or a powerful warhead for strikes on enemy targets.
Last year, the Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) tested a similar concept based on the
deployment of small-unit drone swarms.