The U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) conducted a three-hour artificial intelligence (AI)-navigated sortie of the Kratos Defense & Security Solutions [KTOS] XQ-58A Valkyrie drone at Florida’s Eglin Test and Training Complex on July 25 in what AFRL said was the first flight using AI to control an uncrewed jet.
“The flight was the culmination of the previous two years of partnership that began with the SkyBorg Vanguard program,” AFRL said on Aug. 2.
Data from the July 25 test flight is to feed the Air Force effort to develop multi-mission Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCAs) to be launched from the Next Generation Air Dominance manned fighter and the Lockheed Martin [LMT] F-35A.
Air Force Col. Tucker Hamilton, the Air Force’s chief of AI test and operations, said in the Aug. 2 AFRL statement that the July 25 test “proved out a multi-layer safety framework on an AI/ML-flown uncrewed aircraft and demonstrated an AI/ML agent solving a tactically relevant ‘challenge problem’ during airborne operations.” Hamilton said that the development of AI and machine learning agents for air-to-air and air-to-surface missions is “immediately transferable to the CCA program.”
The algorithms in the July 25 test “were developed by AFRL’s Autonomous Air Combat Operations team,” AFRL said on Aug. 2. “The algorithms matured millions of hours in high fidelity simulation events, sorties on the X-62 VISTA, Hardware-in-the-Loop events with the XQ-58A, and ground test operations.”
AI technology company Shield AI said in June that it had teamed with Kratos to integrate autonomous piloting technology into the XQ-58A (Defense Daily, June 15).
Shield AI said in June that it has developed an AI pilot called Hivemind to operate autonomously without GPS and communications. The company said that the software has already flown on an F-16 fighter, Shield AI’s Group 3 V-BAT unmanned aircraft system (UAS) that takes off and lands vertically but flies like a fixed-wing aircraft, and a small quadcopter UAS.
Brandon Tseng, Shield AI’s president and co-founder, has said that drones unable to operate without GPS and communications will be of little use against high-tech adversaries, and he said that Ukraine is losing thousands of drones monthly due to Russian jamming.
“If an uncrewed aircraft is unable to operate without GPS and without communications, it will be near useless in future conflicts,” Tseng said in a statement. “AI pilots enable teams of aircraft to intelligently execute missions without GPS and communications. When you take an incredible, affordable uncrewed jet aircraft like the XQ-58 and pair it up with our AI pilot, you create a game changing strategic deterrent.”
Air Force Brig. Gen. Scott Cain, the commander of AFRL, said in the lab’s Aug. 2 statement that AI “will be a critical element to future warfighting and the speed at which we’re going to have to understand the operational picture and make decisions.”