US Navy Gives Go-Ahead for Fire-X

The US Navy has given Northrop Grumman, Bell Helicopter and Rolls Royce the green light to deliver eight Fire-X VTOL UAVs in a programme dubbed the ‘next-generation Fire Scout’.


According to Northrop Grumman, a $262 million contract signed on 23 April will see the joint venture produce an initial tranche of UAVs with additional plans for the navy to acquire a further 20 aircraft under a rapid development effort.


The news follows the US Navy’s decision to ground its fleet of 14 MQ-8B Fire Scouts following two recent incidents. Earlier in the month, the navy said system performance and operational procedures were being reviewed following the ditching of a Fire Scout off the coast of West Africa and a separate crash in North Afghanistan.

In June, another Fire Scout was lost in Libya during operations after being launched from the USS Halyburton which had been diverted from counter-piracy operations to support the mission in North Africa.


Based on Bell’s 407 airframe, Northrop Grumman said the MQ-8C Fire-X would provide ‘greater range, endurance and payload capacity to ship commander’s intelligence-gathering efforts’.


Duke Dufresne, VP and GM for unmanned systems at Northrop Grumman said: ‘Through our company-funded Fire-X demonstration effort we proved that using the mature unmanned systems architecture developed for the MQ-8B Fire Scout paired with the Bell 407 helicopter would provide greater capability efficiently and affordably.’

Development of Fire-X started in 2010 with a prototype completing its first autonomous flight at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona within the first year. The aircraft is designed for ISR missions as well as cargo resupply with a payload capacity over 3,200 pounds.


Sources have told Shephard that the UAV would be capable of conducting ISR missions up to 16 hours in duration.