Falls Church, VA-based Northrop Grumman Corporation announced on October 29 that it successfully completed a flight control test of a NASA Global Hawk from its Grand Sky facility near Grand Forks, North Dakota.
Following
takeoff of the NASA Global Hawk by a crew at NASA Armstrong Flight Research
Center (AFRC) in California on Oct. 10, 2019, the flight team at Grand Sky took
control and executed a series of flight maneuvers to demonstrate operational
performance of the Transportable Operations Center in its Grand Sky Mission
Control Center. The in-flight test control operation is a first for the Grand
Sky facility which was opened in April 2017.
“The
ability to conduct flight operations shows the capability of the Grand Sky team
to provide full command and control from our facility. In the near future, we
expect to provide full flight test capability to support our government and
commercial customers,” said Kristen Griffin, strategy director, autonomous
systems, Northrop Grumman. “The important work performed at Grand Sky supports
the evolving needs of our customers while advancing research and development of
our autonomous systems capabilities for today and the future.”
The
flight took off and landed at NASA’s AFRC at Edwards Air Force Base where the
remainder of the flight was controlled. NASA and Northrop Grumman are partnered
under an agreement which allows for use of the NASA Global Hawk system to
explore new mission capabilities.
The
Grand Sky facility is dedicated to fostering autonomous systems and other
capabilities at the Grand Sky Unmanned Aerial Systems Business and Aviation
Park. The facility serves as a nucleus for research and development, pilot,
operator and maintainer training along with operations and mission analysis,
and aircraft maintenance.
The company is building a hangar adjoining the facility to take advantage of Grand Sky’s access to the adjacent Grand Forks Air Force Base, home to the RQ-4 Global Hawk high altitude, long endurance autonomous aircraft.
Source: Northrop Grumman
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