The Border Patrol is conducting market research of small unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS) that can fly like a fixed-wing aircraft but take off and land vertically as part of its monitoring of the northern and southern U.S. borders.
“Hybrid lift solutions that may meet CBP requirements combine the advantages of VTOL and fixed wing solutions into a single airframe,” CBP says in an Aug. 5 Request for Information posted on the government’s procurement website Fedbizopps.gov. “These solutions will provide Border Patrol agents with the ability to extend their missions beyond the capability of existing VTOL solutions while avoiding the potential airframe damage caused by landing fixed wing solutions.”
VTOL refers to vertical take-off-and-landing.
Customs and Border Protection, the parent component that the Border Patrol is part of, established an sUAS program of record in October 2018 after conducting a pilot evaluation using different drones. The agency says it has acquired the Indago 3, Skyraider and Puma 3 sUAS as part of its requirement.
The Indago and Skyraider sUAS are quadcopter VTOL systems supplied by Lockheed Martin [LMT] and FLIR Systems [FLIR] respectively. The Puma is a hand-launched fixed-wing sUAS made by AeroVironment [AVAV]. The Border Patrol has also evaluated AeroVironment’s Raven hand-launched fixed-wing sUAS.
The Border Patrol wants to transport the Hybrid Platform (HP) sUAS in several form factors, from a single backpack to several hard cases that need to be carried by a vehicle close to the final deployment location and operate in a wide-range of environmental conditions, extreme temperature ranges, and in day and night operations. The systems must be ruggedized for transport over difficult terrain and be operable for the duration of an agent’s 10-hour shift.
The HP sUAS systems will provide operators with a video stream to detect, identify, classify and track items of interest in “rugged, remote, rural, urban, riverine, and coastal environments,” the RFI says. The systems will also be used to vector agents to interdict the item of interest and be equipped with a laser illuminator to help agents position themselves to interdict the target.
The numbers of HP sUAS systems needed in each Border Patrol sector will vary based on geography, trained operators, available equipment, and need, the RFI says.
Responses are due by Sept. 13.