LAKEHURST NAS, N.J., 30 Sept. 2010. U.S. Navy persistent surveillance experts are looking to engineers at Logos Technologies Inc. in Arlington, Va., to design and build a reliable wide area persistent surveillance system for deployment on aerostats and airships operating at altitudes between 1,000 and 5,000 feet for the U.S. Army.

Logos will do the work under terms of a $48.4 million contract for a Phase III Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) project called Wide Area Video Image Storage Techniques. Awarding the contract are officials of the U.S. Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, Lakehurst, at Lakehurst Naval Air Station, N.J.

Aerostat-based wide-area surveillance is becoming particularly popular for the U.S. Army, which needs intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) capability that is quick to deploy, easy to relocate, and less expensive than orbiting satellites.

Logos experts will provide one engineering development unit and 13 production copies along with one prototype Kestrel Lite aerostat surveillance system, as well as deployed operations and maintenance support for 12 months.

Work will be in Fairfax, Va.; Goleta, Calif.; and Huntington Beach, Calif., and should be finished by September 2012. For more information contact the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, Lakehurst online at www.navair.navy.mil/lakehurst, or Logos Technologies at www.logos-technologies.com.