UV Online
AUVSI: BAMS continues to hit major milestones
Capt Robert Dishman, PMA 262 Program Manager for the Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) UAS at Naval Air Systems Command has confirmed that the programme is continuing to hit all its milestones with a successful preliminary design review earlier in the year and the expectation that the critical design review (CDR) will be completed in the second quarter of Fiscal Year 2011 (FY11).
Speaking at AUVSI's Unmanned Systems North America conference, Dishman said that four of the eleven subsystems had so far passed their individual CDRs. The four subsystems include the airframe itself as well as the electronic support measures package, advanced mission management system and Wideband Command/Control Communications System.
Another significant milestone for the programme will be achieved on 1 September when the first forward fuselage section of the UAS will enter the jig at Northrop Grumman's Moss Point manufacturing facility. The BAMS Demonstrator 'school house' will also begin operations at Patuxent River Naval Air Station on the same day. Dishman said that BAMS D and elements like the school house were giving the navy 'exposure to this persistent capability' as the main BAMS programme moves forward.
Dishman added that BAMS was meeting all acquisition baseline performance indicators and that he expected the programme to deliver on cost and on schedule. Currently, the US Navy expects to reach an initial operational capability (IOC) with BAMS in 2015. IOC will consist of a single orbit with a further four orbits then being rolled out on an annual basis out to 2019. 'They will then be maintained for at least 20 years,' Dishman stated.
'We are making plans for the future,' he concluded. This includes ensuring that the system has room for growth as the technology develops. Upgrades to the system are expected to include the generation of more electrical power onboard in order to power more demanding payloads such as communications intelligence and signals intelligence sensors that are to be incrementally added to BAMS.
By Darren Lake, Denver
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