This document presents the Department of Defense’s (DoD) roadmap for developing and employing unmanned aerial vehicles (uavs) over the next 25 years
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- 5.5 Communication Infrastructure
- 5.6 Cooperative UAV Flight
5.4 TrainingThe training implications of UAVs are potentially great. Today’s manned aircraft are flown over 95% (50% for ISR aircraft) of the time for peacetime training of aircrews, with the attendant operations and maintenance cost, because aircrews must practice in their environment to maintain their flying proficiency. Remove the aircrew and today’s costly training paradigm requires reexamination. UAV operators could receive the majority of their training in simulators, making their training and qualification significantly less expensive in terms of cost and time to qualify. By decoupling flight training from the number of training aircraft available, larger numbers of UAV operators may be trained in a given period. More air vehicle operators would help mitigate today’s low-density/high-demand operational tempo problem. Lower sortie rates could also lead to related reductions in certain support personnel, with their associated training and sustainment costs. While the potential for savings in training is generally acknowledged, the extent of such savings have not yet been demonstrated (see DARPA effort below). Some level of actual UAV training flying will be required in peacetime to develop techniques and tactics for cooperative missions with manned aircraft—perhaps more to train the manned aircraft crews to operate with UAVs than for the benefit of the UAV crews. Service-unique operating environments, such as aboard aircraft carriers, will also impact the extent to which savings in training can be realized. In addition to the operators, the “boxed aircraft” concept poses significant challenges for training and maintaining a maintenance/logistics support capability ready to support surge or wartime operations tempos. A new paradigm for UAV crew training could evolve that more closely parallels that for recent Navy student pilots using COTS flight simulator software to supplement their traditional flight training. Actual flights would of course still support exercises and real world operations (see Figure 5.4-1). However, initial training, mission qualification, and proficiency training could be conducted largely in simulators, while most of the aircraft remain in ready boxes for months or years at a time. DARPA is exploring this concept by requiring its UCAV to be storable for up to 10 years from production delivery to first flight in specially designed containers optimized for airlift. These hermetically-sealed containers will incorporate monitors and access ports to enable maintenance personnel to check the aircraft’s status without unboxing it. 
Figure 5.4-1: Relative Demand in Actual vs. Simulated Flight Training. While such a “build, box, fly” concept holds promise for reducing UAV operations and support costs (see section 6.3.3) over their life cycle, it also contains several cautions prior to being adopted, to include:
5.5 Communication InfrastructureThe shortage in long haul, wideband other-the-horizon communications will be exacerbated as future ISR platforms, manned and unmanned, are fielded, as described in section 4.2.5. This shortage takes two forms, insufficient bandwidth and lack of coverage in some geographic areas, which can directly constrict global UAV deployment. This infrastructure needs to be increased as these platforms, including UAVs, are fielded. 5.6 Cooperative UAV FlightBrig Gen Daniel P. Leaf, commander of the USAF Air Expeditionary Wing at Aviano, Italy, during Operation Allied Force, identified three capabilities needed by UAVs to fly safely and effectively with manned aircraft, based on his experience with both over Kosovo:
Although manned versus unmanned flight was deconflicted by segregated airspace over Kosovo, the goal of cooperative UAV flight is to conduct operations in integrated airspace. UAVs will have to communicate and interact with each other and with manned aircraft to achieve maximum effectiveness. Consequently they will be required to position themselves when and where needed for optimum use. This positioning will range from station keeping in wide spread constellations to close formation with other UAVs and/or manned aircraft. Such cooperation will enable survivable penetration of defended airspace and permit time compressed coordinated target attacks. The development of the necessary command and control, communications, sensor and weapon technologies, along with their associated software, will be central to fielding these breakthrough capabilities. 6.0 RoadmapThis section brings together the requirements and desired capabilities (section 3) with emerging technological (section 4) and operational opportunities (section 5) in an effort to stimulate the planning process for Department UAV development over the next 25 years. It attempts, through a limited number of examples, to demonstrate a process for selecting opportunities for solving selected shortfalls in capability and incorporating these solutions in Service-planned UAV systems (see Figure 6.2-1). The key question addressed in this section is: When will the technologies required to enable the CINCs’ desired capabilities become available? Directory: intell -> library intell -> Project Fact Sheet Sustainable marketdriven terminal solutions for efficient freight transport (smartset) Main information intell -> Intelligence monitoring drone system intell -> Productivity commission inquiry into intellectual property arrangements mr j coppel, C intell -> A developing country's perspective intell -> Part I: conceptualizing and justifying ip space 3 library -> Appendix e ipb for tactical, operational, and strategic echelons intell -> Afs/Sea Grant Best Student Presentation Summary library -> Writer’s Draft 0 – 4 February 2000 fm 34-10-6/ST library -> Counterintelligence operations Download 0.67 Mb. Share with your friends:
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