"New X-47B Ship Goal: Clear Deck In 90 Sec." Topic

"The U.S. Navy is preparing to conduct a new round of sea trials this summer with its X-47B stealthy aircraft to prove the unmanned system can clear the busy aircraft carrier deck in 90 sec. or less, just like its piloted counterparts.

This would allow for a more seamless flow of manned and unmanned launches and recoveries on deck, a key step toward earning unmanned aircraft a coveted parking space on American carriers in 2020.

In parallel, the Navy plans to finally issue a formal request for proposals (RFP) for its X-47B follow-on, called the Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike (Uclass) system. A draft is expected by the end of the third week of this month, with a final version coming out in the summer, kicking off a long-awaited competition between Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop Grumman and General Atomics to build the first combat unmanned aircraft installed into the carrier air wing…"
Full article here.
link

Wow!. That's fast!.

Amicalement
Armand

This will not end well for the USN pilots, I suspect.

Ah well, perhaps they can apply to be drone mechanics, or cross-train to be drone pilots, at least until they go autonomous, which should happen fairly quickly.

That seems to me like the next logical step to keep them from being hacked by the enemy. Give them a target, route, flight altitude, etc., and let them launch.

Given all the flak that Naval Aviators like to give their Air Force counterparts about UAVs/RPAs, it would be ironic if they themselves became largely obsolete to the same technology even faster than Zoomies. Watching with glee ;)

I don't see why they don't just remote pilot all their aircraft and put the pilots in control pods safely on the ground back in the US or on another ship near by????

They have the tech and they are putting it in the F35 with this type of helmet you don't need to be in the plane to fly it anymore. really Its a super VR helmet so why keep the pilot in the aircraft.
YouTube link

My personal argument – because removing the risk of losing a human pilot lowers the bar for going to violent means to solve issues.

I am for trying to solve issues non-violently if possible; lessening the risk of loss will lower the decision-making threshold to go straight to aggressive action.

I'm no tree-hugger, do-goody peacenik, but I WANT there to be risk involved on OUR part before we decide to bomb someone out of existence – if there is no risk, the decision to do it is quicker and more likely when other means to solve differences might have been explored.

Yea, I have a major problem with drones, as you can tell…

"They have the tech and they are putting it in the F35 with this type of helmet you don't need to be in the plane to fly it anymore".

Yea, they've had the tech since the 1960s, apparently, with the F-102 and F-106 interceptors. The pilot was just along for the ride, and for takeoffs/landings, just in case something went wrong, but was apparently pretty superfluous in the whole "interceptor" role.

As I understand it, the Navy's drones don't even have a flight stick in the control pod. They're sufficiently autonomous that the operator/controller can use a mouse and highlight the target to attack on a mapscreen, and the flying drones will plot the attack routes and execute.

What I think the USN is aiming for is to put the drone controller into the back seat of an EA18 Growler, and while the Growler is running the jamming, the UCLASS drones are attacking the antiair sites. So there are still USN pilots out there, probably mostly in the CAS and CAP roles, while the drones take on the ugly high-risk work of SEAD.

I don't believe drones will be sufficiently autonomous to dogfight for another 50 years.