The second Tier III Minus DarkStar high-altitude endurance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) successfully completed its first flight Monday from the U.S. Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., at 6:14 a.m. (PST). During the 44-minute flight, DarkStar achieved its planned altitude of approximately 5,000 feet and completed all preplanned basic flight maneuvers. The system successfully executed a fully automated flight from takeoff to landing using the differential Global Positioning System (GPS) satellite constellation.
Mark Sussman, Boeing DarkStar program manager, said the achievement
reflects the outstanding efforts of the Lockheed/Boeing/Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency (DARPA) team to remedy several design deficiencies
which contributed to the crash of the first DarkStar air vehicle on its second flight on April 22, 1996.
“Our efforts have focused on upgrades to the vehicle landing gear and
flight control algorithms,” Sussman said. “Additionally, significant upgrades to improve the reliability of all vehicle systems have been incorporated and tested. These upgrades have proven themselves, in both earlier taxi tests and today’s milestone flight.”
The DarkStar team expects to review the flight data and proceed to
higher-altitude flights in the near future. DarkStar’s flight marks the
restart of a flight test program to evaluate basic system performance,
including the high-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and
electro-optical (EO) payloads. At the completion of this work, the air vehicle will be prepared for a series of military exercises.
DarkStar is a high-altitude, low-observable endurance UAV optimized for
reconnaissance in highly defended areas. It will operate within the current
military force structure and with the existing command, control,
communications computer and intelligence equipment. It can operate at a range of 500 nautical miles and stay on station for eight hours at an altitude greater than 45,000 feet. The air vehicle will carry either the SAR or EO payload.
The DarkStar program is managed by DARPA on behalf of the Defense Airborne Reconnaissance Office (DARO). Boeing builds DarkStar’s wings, provides its
avionics and integrates its radar and vehicle management system software.
