The Coast Guard since last August has been evaluating a small, lightweight unmanned aircraft system (UAS) aboard two of its National Security Cutters (NSC) and the system recently helped in a drug bust at sea, a senior service official said yesterday.
The Coast Guard began evaluating the ScanEagle UAS last year and in late May the system was used aboard the Bertholf to help stop a go-fast vessel and interdict 570 kilograms of virgin cocaine, Vice Adm. John Currier, vice commandant of the Coast Guard, told the House Transportation and Infrastructure Coast Guard Subcommittee. The cocaine had a street value of $19 million, Cmdr. Chris German, chief of Law Enforcement for Coast Guard District 11 in California, told Defense Daily.
During the drug bust, a Customs and Border Protection P-3 Maritime Patrol Aircraft that had spotted the suspected go-fast was relieved by the ScanEagle, Currier said. Eventually the unmanned aircraft handed off to an armed HH-65 Dolphin helicopter that was deployed from the Bertholf, which in turn handed off to a Long Range Interceptor (LRI) boat that operates from the NSCs. The LRI made the stop and Coast Guardsmen onboard made the arrests and drug interdiction, Currier said.
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| National Security Cutter Photo: Huntington Ingalls |
This ability of an NSC to have its various assets work together along with the MPA demonstrates a “level of interoperability [that] was simply not available with our legacy assets,” Currier said. “It demonstrates how we apply these updated capabilities to defeat the threats in the offshore environment and I would underscore the offshore environment is our area of greatest risk.”
ScanEagle is made by Boeing’s [BA] Insitu subsidiary. The aircraft was fitted with an electro-optic/infrared camera and auto detection software for the demonstration testing. ScanEagle is launched by a catapult and has been used aboard Navy vessels since 2005.
The testing aboard Bertholf lasted about one month, German said. ScanEagle fits the mold for the kind of capability the Coast Guard is looking at in an unmanned aircraft operating from the cutters but the service isn’t wed to that particular aircraft, he said.
Longer term the Coast Guard is eyeing Northrop Grumman’s [NOC] Fire Scout for operations aboard the NSCs but for now the service is letting the Navy conduct the development of this system, Currier said. He said that ScanEagle can fill about 70 percent of the mission that Fire Scout would aboard the NSC.
Fire Scout is a vertical take-off and landing UAS that looks like a small helicopter. It is larger than ScanEagle.
The Coast Guard’s Research and Development Center first tested ScanEagle aboard the NSC Stratton last August. Another round of ScanEagle testing aboard an NSC is slated for early 2014, a service spokesman told Defense Daily.
The first tests were related to certifying the NSC for unmanned aircraft operations while the recent tests were focused on airspace deconfliction as well as integration with other air assets and the ship itself, the spokesman said.
Currier also noted that the Guardian UAS, which is a variant of the Predator UAS that has been fitted to work in the maritime environment for Customs and Border Protection, should be able to support the Coast Guard’s offshore cutter fleet. He indicated that more work could be done to tailor the Guardian for Coast Guard needs.
The predator is a long-endurance, land-based aircraft made by General Atomics that has been used widely by the Air Force in military operations. CBP also uses the drones for border surveillance missions.
Citing the Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General and the Government Accountability Office, Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R-N.J.) raised concerns that the three NSCs currently deployed and operational with the Coast Guard aren’t meeting their planned requirements. This includes the same number of days at sea per year as the Hamilton-class high endurance cutters that the NSCs are replacing. The Coast Guard plans to acquire eight NSCs to replace 12 Hamilton-class ships.
Currier answered that the legacy vessels have a baseline capability that requires them to be able to operate away from their homeport for 185 days per year. The objective for the NSCs is between 225 and 230 days but are currently only capable of 210 days away from their homeport, he said.
The first three NSCs are scheduled to enter drydock for work and enhancements, Currier said. As these vessels come out of drydock, each boat will be married with an extra crew, which is in line with the original crew rotation cycle, enabling the ships to be away from their homeports for 230 days per year, he said. This will happen by the end of 2017, he noted.
LoBiondo retorted that 2017 is a “long ways off.”
The Obama administration requested about $950 million for Coast Guard acquisition programs in FY ’14, nearly $600 million less than Congress funded in FY ’13. Republicans and Democrats in Congress are generally unhappy with the requested amount, believing that the service won’t be able to replace its legacy aircraft and vessels fast enough to avoid hollowing out its force and leaving some missions unmet.
The House earlier this month approved an FY ’14 Appropriations Bill for the Department of Homeland Security that provides $1.2 billion for Coast Guard acquisition, adding funds for two additional Fast Response Cutters, long-lead funding for the eighth and final NSC, and funds for aircraft.
If the Coast Guard is unable to get the acquisition funds that it needs then decisions will have to be made at some point about which missions the Coast Guard does and does not do, Currier said. These “tough choices” would lead to a Coast Guard that “looks different” over “multiple years,” he said.
The Coast Guard recently began a portfolio review to see how well its assets match up with its 11 statutory mission requirements, Currier said. There is no deadline for the review, although the service has met with DHS and the White House Office of Management and Budget to discuss it, he said.