
MESA, Ariz. — What U.S. military services want in an unmanned spy drone is the ability to loiter for hours at a time--perhaps two dozen--and find the "red jug," a stand-in for all manner of threats to troops on the ground. From 2011 to 2013, the Northrop Grumman [NOC] MQ-8B Fire Scout performed ISR missions for special operations forces (SOF) out of Forward Operating Base Kunduz in northern Afghanistan, capturing several hundred hours of full-motion video surveillance per month. In…