Fire Scout radar to serve as forward spotter for Navy surface ships

Northrop Grumman-built U.S. Navy MQ-8C Fire Scout unman-ned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are set to be upgraded with a Leonardo Osprey 30 Active Electronically Scanned Array (AESA) radar and Link 16 data link, the combination of which will allow the UAV to distribute air-to-air and surface targeting information to ships in a surface action group. Fire Scout with Link 16 is a key enabler of a distributed maritime operations capability and requires no additional modification to any of the other platforms, says Jack Thomas, director of Tactical Autonomous Systems Mission Engineering at Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems.