DragonEye Eyeballs New Orleans for Survivors

What do you do when your best sensor is on a UAV, but the area you need to cover isn't really all that great, and any threat is neutralized?

Why, you mount the UAV on a post on top of a tall building. That's what rescuers have done with the AeroVironment DragonEye UAV, which is fielded by the USMC and has been tested by Joint Forces Command (JFCOM or "Jiffie-com" in GI parlance).

As these photos show, the versatile DragonEye can do its thing even when it's clamped to what looks to this old musician like a PR speaker riser -- on top of a high-rise. In these images, the DragonEye is using its optical sensors to look for stranded people in abandoned New Orleans.

The system it is using here is called ROVER III -- Receive Only Video Enhanced Receiver, third generation. (Some other documents called it Remote Operations Video Enhanced Receiver, which is less redundant, but it's not what the USMC calls it).

Almost nobody came out of Hurricane Katrina creditably. The head of FEMA got the sack, the Mayor, Governor, and even the President caught hell from the press. Congress and the municipal authorities have both taken well-deserved rockets for appropriating millions for flood prevention and then blowing it on things like casinos and marinas.

The press in turn is now catching hell for running what seem to have been a fabricated stories of wholesale violence and death in the SuperDome (real body count: five, four elderly natural causes victims and one suicide by jumping from balcony).

But there were two exceptions to the "everybody's a bum" meme in the press. The military, under Lt. Gen. Russel Honore, came out looking pretty good -- and aviation of all kinds, from this tiny (and temporarily, tethered) micro-UAV, through all the levels of general aviation, up to the military and civilian helicopters that saved thousands.

The DragonEye UAV or SUAV (SMALL Unmanned Air Vehicle) achieved initial operating capability in 2004. It is normally launched by hand -- which is to say, with its motors turning, a burly Marine throws it -- or by bungee (think slingshot -- singularly appropriate for the David vs. Goliath that UAV's represent). The twin engines of the DragonEye are electric; the near-silent powerplants along with the neutral sky color and the small size -- made possible by an ultra-low aspect ratio wing -- make it low-observable, or "stealthy." It's meant for battlefield use within a few miles of the front.

According to congressional testimony by Rear Admiral Anthony L. Winns, USN, Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Air Warfare, and Brigadier General Martin Post, USMC, Assistant Deputy Commandant for Aviation, "Dragon Eye’s mission is to provide the small unit commander a simple, cost effective day/night point reconnaissance and surveillance sensor."

The officers pointed out that the machine was only adopted after a successful combat test in Iraq, and when they testified this May, "over 85% of the Dragon Eye inventory (101 air vehicles and 35 Ground Control  Stations (GCS)) are serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom."

"Two Marines assemble and launch the Dragon Eye... in less than ten minutes.  Controlled autonomously via an L-Band data link and by GPS, Dragon Eye has been indispensable in providing an 'over the next  hill, around the next bend' awareness for Battalion and Company Commanders."

When the DragonEye's mission is over -- assuming that it was a flying mission and not nailed to a skyscraper like this one -- it simply bellies in on the ground. It can land on any kind of surface; turnaround requires the battery to be changed (it's not rechargeable) and the machine to be reprogrammed. Most operational DragonEyes units, which have three planes and one ground station, fly three to five times a day, anywhere from 10 to 45 minutes each.

Of course, in war, you will have losses.

In the first year of operations (to the end of 2004), 22 had been lost, 11 probably to enemy action (the DragonEye flies only 100-500 feet AGL, well within AK-47 range of the ground). The others were mostly pilot error crashes, but some aircraft were lost due to flying out of range of the radio control (oops), or victims of GPS anomalies.

Another version, the Swift, uses the same basic airframe but has a little more endurance and therefore range, and does not have DragonEye's ability to change flight plans inflight -- it only flies a preprogrammed path.

AeroVironment is a pioneer in lightweight composite construction, alternative power, and UAV technology. Previous AV products include the Gossamer Condor and Gossamer Albatross human-powered aircraft and the record-setting NASA Helios unmanned solar-powered aircraft, as well as the DragonEye, Pointer, and other UAVs.

Everyone expected UAVs to save pilots' lives -- and after all, no one was hurt in those DragonEyes downed by groundfire or crashed by pilot error. And the USMC fully expected them to save Marines' lives. But no one was expecting them to show up in New Orleans and save civilian lives.

Although the craft isn't beautiful to begin with, and gives up a lot of style when it's mounted on a stick, it probably doesn't matter much to anybody needing rescue.

FMI: www.avsuav.com