Article Posted on : - Sep 02, 2010

An artistic conception of the new drone. A Northrop photo

MOSS POINT, USA (BNS): Defence company Northrop Grumman has begun work on the first MQ-4 Broad Area Maritime Surveillance unmanned aircraft system (BAMS UAS) for the US Navy.

Work on the new aircraft system began at the company's Moss Point, Mississippi manufacturing facility on Wednesday in the presence of US Navy officials, Northrop said.

The MQ-4 Broad Area drone is a multi-mission maritime intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) system. The aircraft is based on the Northrop-designed RQ-4 Global Hawk High Altitude, Long Endurance (HALE) unmanned aircraft system platform.

The BAMS UAS is being designed to support a variety of missions. It can operate independently or in direct collaboration with fleet assets.

The aircraft will be able to provide continuous on-station presence while conducting open-ocean and littoral surveillance of targets. When operational, BAMS will play a key role in providing commanders with a persistent, reliable picture of surface threats, covering vast areas of open-ocean and littoral regions, minimizing the need to utilise other manned assets to execute surveillance and reconnaissance tasks, Northrop said.

The company was awarded a contract on April 22, 2008 to produce the new drones for the US Navy.