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i 

80–763 2013

[H.A.S.C. No. 113–34] 

HEARING 

ON

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT 

FOR FISCAL YEAR 2014 

AND

OVERSIGHT OF PREVIOUSLY AUTHORIZED 

PROGRAMS 

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR 

AND LAND FORCES HEARING 

ON

POST IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN: CURRENT 

AND FUTURE ROLES FOR UAS AND THE 

FISCAL YEAR 2014 BUDGET REQUEST 

HEARING HELD 

APRIL 23, 2013 
(II) 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND LAND FORCES 

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio, Chairman 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

JOHN FLEMING, Louisiana 

CHRISTOPHER P. GIBSON, New York 

JON RUNYAN, New Jersey 

MARTHA ROBY, Alabama 

PAUL COOK, California 

JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma 

BRAD R. WENSTRUP, Ohio 

JACKIE WALORSKI, Indiana 

MAC THORNBERRY, Texas 

WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina 

ROB BISHOP, Utah 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

MIKE MCINTYRE, North Carolina 

JIM COOPER, Tennessee 

JOHN GARAMENDI, California 

RON BARBER, Arizona 

DANIEL B. MAFFEI, New York 

JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas 

TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois 

WILLIAM L. ENYART, Illinois 

PETE P. GALLEGO, Texas 

MARC A. VEASEY, Texas 

JOHN SULLIVAN, Professional Staff Member 

DOUG BUSH, Professional Staff Member 

JULIE HERBERT, Clerk 
(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS 

2013 

Page 

HEARING: 

Tuesday, April 23, 2013, Post Iraq and Afghanistan: Current and Future 

Roles for UAS and the Fiscal Year 2014 Budget Request ................................ 1 

APPENDIX: 

Tuesday, April 23, 2013 .......................................................................................... 23 

TUESDAY, APRIL 23, 2013 

POST IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN: CURRENT AND FUTURE ROLES FOR 

UAS AND THE FISCAL YEAR 2014 BUDGET REQUEST 

STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Turner, Hon. Michael R., a Representative from Ohio, Chairman, Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces ...................................................... 1 

WITNESSES 

Pennington, Steven, Director, Bases, Ranges, and Airspace, and Acting Executive Director, Department of Defense Policy Board on Federal Aviation, 

U.S. Air Force ....................................................................................................... 6 

Tierney, COL Patrick E., USA, Director, Army Aviation, G–3/5/7, U.S. Army .. 7 

Weatherington, Dyke D., Director, Unmanned Warfare and Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance, Department of Defense ................................... 4 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS: 

Pennington, Steven .......................................................................................... 43 

Tierney, COL Patrick E. .................................................................................. 49 

Weatherington, Dyke D. ................................................................................... 27 

DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD: 

[There were no Documents submitted.] 

WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING THE HEARING: 

Mr. Cook ............................................................................................................ 57 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING: 

Mr. Turner ........................................................................................................ 61 

(1) 

POST IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN: CURRENT AND FUTURE 

ROLES FOR UAS AND THE FISCAL YEAR 2014 BUDGET 

REQUEST 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON TACTICAL AIR AND LAND FORCES, Dayton, OH, Tuesday, April 23, 2013. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 11:30 a.m., at Sinclair Community College, Dayton, Ohio, Hon. Michael Turner 

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MICHAEL TURNER, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM OHIO, CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

TACTICAL AIR AND LAND FORCES 

Mr. TURNER. Good morning. We will call to order the hearing of 

the Tactical Air and Land Forces. 

I am very pleased here as we look at the issue of the Department 

of Defense [DOD] unmanned aerial systems [UAS] programs for 

the fiscal year 2014. And before I begin, I would like to recognize 

the members of the Air and Land Subcommittee. 

I am very pleased to have Chairman Frank LoBiondo with me, 

who represents the Second District of New Jersey. He is not only 

a member of our subcommittee and a member of the Armed Services Committee, he is also chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Subcommittee on Aviation. In addition, he 

has jurisdiction over the FAA [Federal Aviation Administration], 

who is overseeing the test range selection process, and he has been 

a leader in this issue, including being the author of the language 

for the six test sites. 

We worked very closely with him as the National Defense Authorization Act came forward and the language that they worked 

on in the Transportation Committee, trying to ensure that we had 

coordination between the Department of Defense, where a lot of the 

resident knowledge is on operations and development of UASs and 

UAVs [unmanned aerial vehicles], and the FAA. And then also including NASA [National Aeronautics and Space Administration], 

which has a significant amount of expertise. Ensuring that by pulling this collaborative process together, we might also then advance 

the work that is being done at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base 

through this process. 

Also I would like to recognize Brad Wenstrup, who represents 

Ohio’s Second Congressional District just south of us, eastern Cincinnati and Portsmouth. In addition to being a Member of Congress, he is a lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve and served 

a year of active duty in Iraq, where he was chief of surgery with 
2 

the 344th Combat Support Hospital. He was awarded the Bronze 

Star and Combat Action Badge for his service in Iraq. 

He is a fellow member of the Armed Services Committee, and obviously, being a Member of Congress from southwest Ohio, I am 

very pleased to have him both on the full committee of the Armed 

Services Committee, our subcommittee, and then here today. 

Brad, thank you for being here. 

Dr. WENSTRUP. Thank you. 

Mr. TURNER. And then, next, we have Congressman Paul Cook, 

who represents the Eighth Congressional District of California. He 

has traveled a long way to be here. He is a retired Marine Corps 

infantry colonel who served in Vietnam. His career spanned 26 

years and earned him a number of honors, including two Purple 

Hearts and the Bronze Star Medal with Valor device. 

Mr. Cook, thank you for being here, and thank you for your contribution on the Armed Services Committee and for advancing the 

issues of UASs and UAVs. 

I want to welcome our panel of witnesses here today. We have 

Mr. Dyke Weatherington, Director, Unmanned Warfare and Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance. We have Mr. Steven 

Pennington, Director of Bases, Ranges, and Airspace and Acting 

Executive Director for the Department of Defense Policy Board on 

Federal Aviation; and we have Colonel Patrick Tierney, Director of 

Army Aviation. 

Before we begin, I would like to thank Sinclair Community College for making this auditorium available to us, and especially 

Steve Johnson, the president of Sinclair. Steve, are you here? 

Steve, if you would stand, I want to recognize you. Thank you. 

And also Adam Murka, the director of public information, for 

their efforts to make this hearing possible and all they are doing 

to try to advance UASs and UAVs in our community. 

As most of you here are aware, the Wright Brothers were from 

Dayton, Ohio. They invented flight, and the region has excelled in 

advancing the industry of aerospace ever since. Ohio has a long 

tradition of unmanned systems innovation. The world’s first unmanned aircraft system, the Kettering Bug, was developed here by 

the Dayton Wright Airplane Company in 1918. 

The international UAS promotional organization, the Association 

for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International, AUVSI, was founded 

here in Dayton in 1972. And much of the research and technology 

that goes in today’s UASs was developed right here at WrightPatterson Air Force Base. 

Today, the Dayton region and the State of Ohio strongly support 

the work we do with unmanned systems. Last year, the Ohio General Assembly passed a resolution noting that ‘‘collaborative relationships are well established in Ohio for research, development, 

testing, training, and manufacturing of unmanned aerial systems, 

including universities, manufacturers, researchers, workforce developers, the Ohio National Guard, the State of Ohio, and military, 

commercial, and private airspace users.’’ 

Ohio represents a unique and powerful leverage of research and 

development work in UAS integration, building on the Air Force 

Research Laboratory, AFRL, here at Wright-Patterson Air Force 
3 

Base and the NASA Glenn Research Center in Cleveland and the 

extensive Ohio aerospace contractor base. 

Our national laboratories are doing critical work with the key enabling technologies to integrate unmanned systems into the national airspace, including sense and avoidance technology at Air 

Force Research Labs and secure command and control communication technology at NASA Glenn. 

Our institutions of higher education—University of Dayton, 

Wright State University, and our host today, Sinclair Community 

College—are national leaders in research, education, and training 

for unmanned systems. Working together with our national laboratories and industry throughout the State and Nation, these educational institutions will ensure that Ohio’s future in unmanned 

systems is every bit as robust as our rich history. 

The unmanned aerial systems, or UAS, conference taking place 

here at Sinclair Community College is timely because unmanned 

aerial systems and their associated sensor technologies are moving 

to the civilian sector. The Federal Aviation Administration, or FAA, 

Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 directed the FAA to establish a program to integrate unmanned aerial systems into the National Airspace System at six test ranges. The designation and operation of test sites will be a tool for testing all aspects of UAS integration. 

On February 14th of this year, the FAA issued a screening information request, SIR, for proposals to manage these sites. Last year, 

the subcommittee that I chair, the Subcommittee on Tactical Air 

and Land Forces in the House Armed Services Committee, introduced legislation that directed the Secretary of Defense to collaborate with the FAA and NASA on solutions to the challenges of UAS 

integration with the National Airspace System, or NAS, and provide an annual report on the progress being made in this area. 

While there are multiple uses for unmanned aerial systems in 

the National Airspace System, the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International has recently concluded that over 100,000 

new jobs could be created by 2025 through UAS use, primarily in 

the commercial and civilian market areas of precision, agriculture, 

and public safety. 

The migration of UAS aircraft and sensor technology to the civilian sector will provide for greater competition, innovations in technology for both civilian and military missions, and eventually decrease cost for both the Government and private sector. The U.S. 

military will continue to use unmanned aerial systems for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions, as well as weapons delivery platforms. 

Turning to our subject today, the fiscal year 2014 budget request 

for unmanned aerial systems, the Department of Defense plans to 

invest $2.3 billion for research, development, and procurement of 

unmanned aerial systems. The request for year 2014, unfortunately, is a decrease of $1.1 billion from the request for the fiscal 

year 2013. 

The administration plans to produce some 234 fewer unmanned 

aerial systems than last year. I have concerns about whether this 

request will meet both the warfighter requirements and the emerging technologies and opportunities of UASs and UAVs. I hope our 
4 

witnesses will address this issue today, and we welcome their response. 

Without objection, all of the witnesses’ prepared statements will 

be included in the hearing record, and we will ask each witness to 

provide an opening remark. And then we will have questions from 

the four Members of Congress who are here. 

We are going to begin with Mr. Weatherington. If you would 

please proceed with your opening statement. 

STATEMENT OF DYKE D. WEATHERINGTON, DIRECTOR, UNMANNED WARFARE AND INTELLIGENCE, SURVEILLANCE, 

AND RECONNAISSANCE, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the 

committee, for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the current Department of Defense unmanned aircraft acquisition programs and their role post Iraq and Afghanistan. 

I am also pleased to address the related fiscal year 2014 President’s budget request and the Department’s activities related to the 

integration of DOD unmanned aircraft into the National Airspace 

System. I will be brief in order to move quickly to your questions. 

I will begin by describing the scope of the Department’s unmanned aircraft systems activity, both in terms of numbers and 

types of systems fielded and in terms of numbers of hours flown. 

I will then highlight the ongoing 2014 unmanned aircraft acquisition programs funded by the President’s fiscal year 2014 budget request and then close with a short summary on the ongoing airspace 

integration efforts that will enable unmanned aircraft capabilities 

for operators and systems returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. 

The Department has a number of and operates a wide range of 

unmanned aircraft varying in missions, capability, sizes, and performance. The systems also support a wide range of warfighter 

needs. DOD categorizes these aircraft systems into five groups 

based on various capabilities, such as maximum takeoff weight, operating altitudes, and speed. 

Group 1 aircraft typically weigh less than 20 pounds and fly at 

altitudes less than 1,200 feet and at speeds less than 100 knots 

and typically in the vicinity of the operator. They number close to 

9,500 aircraft out of the total DOD unmanned aircraft inventory of 

approximately 10,700 aircraft. The hand-launched Raven is an example of a Group 1 aircraft. 

At the other extreme are Group 5 aircraft that weigh more than 

1,300 pounds and typically operate at altitudes greater than 18,000 

feet and typically are operated beyond line of sight. The jet-powered Global Hawk, comparable in size to a small commercial airliner, operates at altitudes greater than 55,000 feet. Another Group 

5 aircraft is the Air Force Reaper, and DOD has about 130 Group 

5 aircraft in its current inventory today. 

In terms of flight hours, DOD unmanned aircraft have amassed 

over 4 million flight hours in the last 10 years, growing from approximately 16,000 hours in 2001 to nearly 700,000 operational 

hours in 2011. And these numbers do not include the Group 1 systems. 

Flight hours declined to about 550,000 hours in 2012, as operations in Iraq completed and those in Afghanistan stabilized. His-
5 

torically, about 80 to 90 percent of all the hours flown in DOD are 

combat-related hours. 

With respect to the role of unmanned aircraft post Iraq and Afghanistan, the Department will continue to intelligently shape an 

affordable intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, typically 

known as ISR, capability for our unmanned aircraft systems portfolio to meet DOD’s requirements. Since we cannot predict the future strategic environment and how that will develop, we need to 

maintain a robust ISR enterprise capable of supporting the full 

spectrum of military operations anywhere around the world. 

Having more home-based systems will provide a more normal 

training environment, enabling the training pipeline to recover 

from years of high-tempo operations. In all cases, the current budgetary climate dictates that we proceed smartly in terms of how we 

acquire and apportion ISR systems, including unmanned, to best 

deal with the evolving strategic environment. 

In the future roles category, unmanned aircraft are likely to support many of the operations they do today, including ISR, also communications relay, logistics resupply, and providing our combat capability of limited strike. DOD’s unmanned systems portfolio will 

continue to be based on combatant commanders’ needs within the 

current physical environment. In terms of the President’s 2014 budget, it includes about $1.4 

billion for unmanned aircraft systems research, development, test, 

and evaluation and about $1.2 billion for unmanned aircraft systems procurement. Compared to the fiscal year 2013 budget, as the 

chairman has indicated, this is a decrease of about $700 million, 

or about 34 percent, in research, development, test, and evaluation 

and a little over $600 million decrease in procurement. 

The 2014 budget request funds these programs: the Air Force’s 

Reaper and Global Hawk Block 40 programs; the Navy’s Triton, 

sometimes known as BAMS [broad area maritime surveillance]; 

Fire Scout; the Marine Corps Small Tactical UAS program; and the 

new UCLASS [Unmanned Carrier Launched Airborne Surveillance 

and Strike] Navy program. It also funds the completion of the 

Army’s Gray Eagle program and also funds the multi-service small 

hand-launched Group 1 systems of which there are several platforms. 

The budget also funds the U.S. commitments to the NATO 

[North Atlantic Treaty Organization] Alliance Ground System, or 

AGS, and sustains and improves the fielded capability the Air 

Force has in Predator and the Army and Marine Corps Shadow 

systems. 

From an airspace integration perspective, DOD has been working 

this challenge for a long period of time, and our long-term goal is 

to provide routine safe access to the National Airspace System for 

properly equipped DOD aircraft. The Department’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Plan provides an overview of how the Department plans to accomplish this goal incrementally and is available online to the public. 

The Department’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Task Force is the 

DOD advocate for shaping regulatory policy, procedures, and certification standards and technology development activities that are 

critical to the integration of DOD unmanned aircraft into the na-
6 

tional airspace. Task force leadership and participation with the 

DOD Policy Board for Federal Aviation also serves as a congressionally directed multi-agency Unmanned Aircraft Systems Executive Committee, known as the ExCom. The ExCom’s goal is to coordinate and align airspace integration efforts among FAA, DHS 

[Department of Homeland Security], DOD, and NASA. 

In October 2010, the Executive Committee developed and provided to the congressional committees a National Airspace Access 

Plan for Federal Public Unmanned Aircraft Systems, which identified needs, challenges, and an incremental approach to meeting 

these challenges. The plan also provides specific recommendations 

in the areas of policy, regulation, and technology. 

With that, I will conclude. I thank you for your support, and at 

this time, I will be happy to answer any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Weatherington can be found in 

the Appendix on page 27.] 

STATEMENT OF STEVEN PENNINGTON, DIRECTOR, BASES, 

RANGES, AND AIRSPACE, AND ACTING EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE POLICY BOARD ON FEDERAL AVIATION, U.S. AIR FORCE 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Thanks for having my written testimony put 

into the record. I would like to just highlight two things and get 

onto the questioning sooner. 

First, to the entire group of congressmen here, but particularly 

Congressmen Turner and LoBiondo, the 2012 NDAA and FAA reauthorization were very, very helpful to encouraging multiple defense—multiple agencies to work together to advance UAS integration in the NAS. And so, we are working closely, as you all know, 

with our partners in the FAA. They are the lead for the U.S. test 

sites. We are working closely to make sure they understand the defense equities. 

AFRL [Air Force Research Laboratory] is in the room today. We 

are continuing collaboration between AFRL and the Tech Center 

and various other FAA centers to, in fact, move research and development from various centers, whether it is DOD or whether it is 

FAA, back and forth. 

The final thing I would like to highlight is that DOD has a long 

history of building advanced capabilities and not just doing the 

R&D [research and development], which is certainly very important, but also building the training pipelines and then the ops procedures. So what we refer to that as is airworthiness certification 

for the aircraft. So DOD has an airworthiness certification capability that we do for all aircraft, including UAS, including small 

UAS. 

Likewise, we have a pilot training standard. In the civil parlance, 

it would be referred to as licensing. So we train pilots and operators based upon the type of UASs they fly. 

And then the final piece is we have developed operational procedures. So whether you are flying in the NAS or you are flying in 

Afghanistan or formerly in Iraq, we have developed operational 

procedures in the terminal area, arrivals and departures, and an 

en route system. 
7 

We believe this body of information, from the far end at research 

and development all the way to operational procedures, could be 

very, very helpful to our FAA partners in building civil standards 

for airworthiness, civil standards for pilot licensing, and then, of 

course, ops procedures for use in the NAS. 

So, again, I look forward to your questions, and I will turn it over 

to Colonel Tierney. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Pennington can be found in the 

Appendix on page 43.] 

STATEMENT OF COL PATRICK E. TIERNEY, USA, DIRECTOR, 

ARMY AVIATION, G–3/5/7, U.S. ARMY 

Colonel TIERNEY. Thank you for the invitation to participate. 

I have given written testimony for the record, and in order to 

save time, I will forego reading and presenting it and get right to 

your questions. 

Thanks. 

[The prepared statement of Colonel Tierney can be found in the 

Appendix on page 49.] 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you. 

In almost all of your comments, you touched on some of the areas 

that we are interested in and I know that participants in the conference are interested in. 

Mr. Pennington, I am going to begin with you. Thank you for referencing the negotiations and the discussions between DOD and 

the FAA, and I am going to ask you a question about the status 

of the negotiations. 

I also then, Mr. Weatherington, I am going to ask you about the 

issue of that cooperative relationship that the Armed Services Committee has tried to encourage—in other words, require—— 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. TURNER [continuing]. Between the FAA, DOD, AFRL, and 

NASA Glenn. 

So starting first with Mr. Pennington, you have been very active 

in this issue, and DOD and the FAA have been negotiating for 

years on UAS operations into the national airspace. Now that we 

have this provision that Mr. LoBiondo had worked so diligently on, 

of the six proposed test sites, what can you share with us on the 

status of those negotiations or any aspect of what we may currently 

know about the process? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. So, sir, as you mentioned, the SIR [screening 

information request] is on the street, and the agreement we have 

with our FAA partners is that when they begin actually reviewing 

the proposals, they will involve DOD. And my office will work with 

Dyke’s office and, in fact, all of the offices across DOD to make sure 

that we understand whatever equities are involved and then do the 

best that we can in this process to deliver something that is useful 

to the Nation. 

The only caveat I will give to you, sir, is that, as you know, in 

sequestration, we have challenges. So in the near term, I don’t 

know that DOD has any significant material assistance we can provide to the test sites. There will certainly be potentially in-kind. 
8 

But the material assistance, we simply probably don’t have the capability to do it under the current sequestration. 

The final piece is we all believe that these test sites potentially 

could be very useful to aiding the FAA in building these three 

pieces, pillars, to civil integration, which is airworthiness, pilot licensing, and then, finally, the operational procedures. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you. 

And I appreciate you mentioning the effects of sequestration. In 

this committee, we are all very concerned also, the personal aspects 

of those at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base who may be facing furloughs. 

As you may be aware, I voted against this mess because I was 

so concerned as to what the effects would be on our national security, and we are certainly seeing them in all aspects of what we are 

trying to advance. And I appreciate you acknowledging that even 

in this, there are effects and implications. 

Mr. Weatherington, you had mentioned the Executive Committee 

aspect in your overall comments of AFRL, FAA, NASA, and DOD. 

Can you tell me how that cooperative relationship is going there? 

Any difficulties? 

As we look to putting together the National Defense Authorization Act for this year, we are going to be looking again to encourage—require—this cooperation and some aspect of trying to advance UASs in the national airspace with an understanding that 

not only does DOD have a need for operating in our domestic airspace, but also has the incredible knowledge that could advance us 

on the civilian and commercial aspects. 

So what insight could you give us about how that cooperative relationship is going? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Thank you, Chairman Turner, for the 

question. 

At the macro level, I believe and my boss, who is the DOD representative at the principal level on the ExCom, would agree that 

we made significant progress in the UAS ExCom. We have been 

working it about 4 years now. Initially, we started out at basically 

the tactical level, working procedural activities that would improve 

DOD, DHS, and NASA access to the NAS. That is really improving 

the COA [certificate of authorization] process, as you indicated in 

your opening remarks. 

Since that time, we have addressed a number of those issues and 

improved that process, and now we are moving on to more substantial activities that, from my perspective, both help DOD and the 

other Federal public users, but also, as Mr. Pennington alluded to, 

provide a framework then to move on to a wider consumer base for 

unmanned aircraft systems. 

Specifically in that is addressing the see and avoid, sense and 

avoid capability that is articulated in 91–113. We are working that 

right now very heavily within the ExCom, developing short-, 

mid-, and long-term solution sets that support primarily again the 

Federal public user base, but also provide a long-term strategy for 

a broader user set. 

Also, to amplify on Steve’s answer to your previous question, in 

developing the plan for the test sites, FAA came to DOD and asked 

us for expertise first in the development of the contract that they 
9 

would use for that. And so, DOD provided contract expertise from 

actually the DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] 

organization for the type of contract they were going to use. 

Since that time, FAA has identified specific skill sets that would 

be beneficial in the evaluation of those proposals. And so, DOD is 

working those particular skill sets at an individual level name that 

we can provide to help FAA more adequately address those proposals when they come in. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you, both. 

I want to again thank the other three Members for both their 

leadership on this issue and their partnership, and for their being 

here today. I think it certainly shows the long-term interest that 

Members of Congress have and that our committee has on how this 

process is going to go. 

And with that, I want to recognize Mr. LoBiondo. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to be here today. I 

want to thank our panel and my colleagues for joining us and you, 

Mike, for calling this hearing. 

Also thank you for your expertise, your dedication and commitment to all things DOD, but especially in this particular area, 

where there is exciting new program that is getting ready to get 

off the ground. 

I represent the Federal Aviation Administration Technical Center in Atlantic City, which is the premier facility in the Nation for 

safety and security research and development. So I have a pretty 

vested interest in all of this. They have been designated to do all 

the validation for the next generation of air traffic control, and this 

is kind of a natural fold-in to that. 

So we also have at that campus complex the 177th Fighter Wing, 

and attached to that is the Warren Grove Range. Mr. Pennington, 

the Warren Grove Range offers a tremendous amount of land area 

and airspace that is being utilized by the FAA Tech Center for 

their ScanEagle flight demonstrations. 

Do you know if there are any plans for the Air Force to expand 

the UAS flight operations into Warren Grove? And if not, is that 

something you and your team would consider looking at for an official position? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Sir, if the 177th and the FAA desire to do 

such, they will bring it back through Headquarters Air Force, and 

we will work it relatively quickly. As you know, there has been— 

this is a long-term presence of the fighter wing that has been there 

and then, secondly, of the range. And my organization, as you 

know, also oversees the range. 

But yes, sir, we would quickly look into it. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you. 

Secondly, also Mr. Pennington, as you are aware, the upcoming 

FAA designations of the six UAS test sites are supposed to be coordinated with NextGen, among other requirements. Do you have 

any idea or can you tell us what the Air Force is currently undertaking to integrate NextGen into the UAS research and development and operations? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. So, sir, yes. We have Jack Blackhurst here. We 

also have Paul Schaeffer. We are working very, very closely with 
10 

the FAA NextGen office and looking at the technologies, starting 

with ADSB, automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast, out. And 

there is a series of efforts inside of DOD looking at miniaturizing 

ADSB transceivers and seeing if we can fit them onto UASs, sir. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. And can you say if there are any best practices 

that the FAA should be talking to DOD about when figuring out 

how these test sites should be accomplished and everything put together? I am assuming that those conversations are already happening. At least I hope they are. 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Yes, sir. As Dyke mentioned, we have been 

having those conversations from the very beginning when we received the test site language in both agencies. We have been discussing a criterias-based approach and then letting the test sites 

be incubators for the three things that I talked about earlier—airworthiness, pilot licensing and training, and also ops procedures to 

facilitate the creation of a civil market. 

And then we believe that it would also help DOD in providing 

a broader access to the NAS. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you. 

Mr. Weatherington, as chairing the Aviation Subcommittee 

under Transportation and Infrastructure, our subcommittee will be 

taking an in-depth look at UAS integration into the National Airspace System over the coming months. I think you can see that 

from today’s hearing, there will be a lot of interest in moving forward from a lot of different areas. 

I wanted to get your opinions on what you think the biggest obstacles our FAA partners should focus on to make this happen safely? And secondly, what do you think would be the greatest gains 

for the general public with this? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Sure, sir. So from a DOD perspective, I 

can tell you probably the biggest single challenge that we see in 

airspace integration is defining an alternate means of compliance 

for the see and avoid capability. 

FAA recently indicated that their current position on see and 

avoid is that can only be accomplished by a human on the aircraft, 

in the aircraft, and so there is no other way to provide that capability, which forces DOD and, frankly, all the other users into the 

COA process. 

Today, the COA process is working pretty good. As I indicated, 

we made some process changes within FAA, and that has helped 

a lot. But eventually, DOD’s position is we have got to move beyond the COA process. 

To do that, we have to reach agreement with FAA on how we 

meet a see and avoid capability. So that is that short-, medium-, 

and long-term process that I mentioned before. 

Recently, DOD certified its first see and avoid capability in the 

ground-based method of operation at Cherry Point Marine Corps 

station. We are working with FAA for them to acknowledge that 

certification and allow us to use that under a COA process. The Air 

Force will probably follow that lead with their own ground-based 

system, probably at Cannon Air Force Base, and then the Army 

will follow them. 

So this solution for see and avoid is really upon us right now. 

DOD and the other Federal public agencies have some flexibility 
11 

because we—as Mr. Pennington indicated, we have the ability to 

self-certify. But ultimately, it is FAA that will ultimately make the 

decision if that system is safe to operate in the NAS. And so, that 

is the challenge we have in the short term. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Okay. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you. 

Mr. Cook. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

In reading the background material, I was concerned about the 

number of mishaps. And if I understand it correctly, the trend on 

this is going down more and more and more. And so, I am trying 

to get some insight into this, and I don’t want to say pilot error, 

but I guess it is a pilot because they got the joystick, or operator 

error. 

I am very concerned about that, on how we can—you know, if we 

are going to budget all of these platforms in the future, and it is 

a very expensive, some of them are very expensive pieces of gear. 

If you could kind of address the issue of accidents, whether it is 

pilot error, operator error, or how vulnerable they are to enemy action, such as even machine gun fire? 

You don’t have to go into SAMs [Standard Army Maintenance]. 

I think everybody knows that, but if you can address that, I would 

appreciate it. 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Yes, sir. So the good news is, much like almost any other aircraft system that DOD develops, the accident 

rate for the entire class of unmanned aircraft systems has been following a very predictable trend downward. 

And as a follow-up to this, I can provide you data that indicates 

that, for example, today the aircraft Class A rate, which is a whole 

loss or an accident that results in fatality, for the Air Force unmanned aircraft system portfolio is about 5 per 100,000 flight 

hours. Five years ago, it was about 20 per 100,000 flight hours. 

[The information referred to can be found in the Appendix on 

page 57.] 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. So the trend has been down. Last year, it 

was about 6.5. So the trend continues to fall. And if you lay that 

curve on top of other curves for other kinds of aircraft, the slope 

of the curve is almost identical. 

Now the comparison for all Air Force aircraft, the loss rate is 

about—Class A rate is about 1 per 100,000. So unmanned aircraft 

are still higher than the total aircraft loss rate. But when you compare the types of aircraft that the Air Force is flying, they line up 

much better with the construction and the operation that you 

would find in general aviation aircraft. 

If you look at the general aviation loss rate, that rate over the 

last 3 or 4 years runs between 5 and 7 or 8 per 100,000 aircraft. 

So from a DOD perspective, we believe that the loss rate is going 

to continue to reduce. We believe that we are on a good trend. 

As to the specific reasons for those loss rates, it is spread about 

equally between equipment failures, like loss of an engine—in fact, 

the last Air Force loss they had was a Predator in theater that had 

an engine failure—and pilot error. And DOD is working both of 
12 

those activities through a number of research and development activities. Many of them have gained significant success. 

Colonel Tierney likely will tell you that the Army on its Gray 

Eagle program about 3 years ago instituted an auto-land system on 

their Gray Eagle programs, automates the landing and takeoff of 

that system. And that significantly reduced the loss rate we saw 

in that class of systems, compared to what we were doing before. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you. 

I appreciate that. I just wanted to also ask about the expense 

cost of the Broad Area Maritime Surveillance units. They are twice 

as much as the ones that are going to be ordered for the Navy/Marine Corps than the Air Force. I think they are twice as much. 

Wasn’t it $22 million as opposed to going up to $50 million something? 

And I understand the bells and whistles and everything like 

that, but it just seems like that is a pretty steep change on something. If you could address that? 

By the way, you might want to get rid of that acronym. That has 

been around a long while, and it wasn’t very complimentary to 

some people. So always beware of acronyms. As somebody in the 

Marine Corps a long time, that is—I kind of hate them, if you 

haven’t figured that out. 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. So the BAMS program is—now the Navy 

refers to that as the Triton program. It is a derivative of the Global 

Hawk platform that the Air Force currently flies. 

The Navy had to make some changes in that platform from a 

sensor perspective because the Navy was operating primarily in a 

maritime environment. They also added some capabilities to improve safety. 

So, for example, the BAMS aircraft incorporates lightning protection for lightning strike. It incorporates de-icing capability, and it 

improves the redundancy system through the triplex system that 

they have today. 

The cost of the BAMS Triton system actually lines up pretty 

closely with what the Air Force previously paid for their Air Force 

Block 30 program. So we don’t see a significant cost change between the previous system that DOD was buying in Global Hawk 

and the current BAMS capability. 

Now there are a couple other Navy programs that are on the horizon. The UCLASS program, the carrier-based program, is very 

early in the acquisition phase, has not met Milestone A yet. And 

so, we haven’t defined that program specifically yet. 

And then the other program is the STUAS [Small Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System] program, which currently is for the Marine Corps today, which is a small system, a Group 3 system that 

operates off surface combatants. 

Mr. COOK. I am going to show my ignorance here, if I haven’t already done that. Years ago, in fact, it was the tail end of my career, 

we had the Pioneer, which—and that is completely gone now. The 

Shadow is the next. How effective is that in terms of the truck and 

the launch and everything? 

It kind of seemed primitive when I saw it. Of course, that was 

a number of years ago, and being an infantry type, all this stuff, 
13 

and I certainly appreciate your indulgence in explaining this to me. 

But—— 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Yes, sir. So I could certainly answer your 

question, but I think Colonel Tierney would be much more appropriate to answer that question. 

The Marine Corps and the Army operate identical Shadow systems in theater today. 

Mr. COOK. Yes, that is what I started with. 

Colonel TIERNEY. Well, I could add to that, sir, is in terms of the 

Shadow has been extremely effective for the BCTs, the brigade 

combat teams, that organic UAS capability that that brigade commander owns and can count on. 

In reference to the launcher, the way that system works is it is 

basically just launched off a catapult. And what is really great 

about that is running a whole airfield that you have got helicopters 

coming in and Air Force aircraft, is it really only consumes the— 

it doesn’t consume the runway. 

You can launch it from being the runway. So while aircraft are 

still taking off and landing, that Shadow is continuing to take off 

and then just offset to a much shorter runway. So while it looks 

kind of primitive, it really gives you a great capability to launch 

them anywhere. 

Combined with the system’s ability for its automatic takeoff, 

automatic landing—for the Army systems across the board, there 

is no man in the loop on a stick and rudder. Everything is automated. If it loses link, it comes back and automatically lands, and 

the operator’s input is moving where it is by basically a joystick 

around on a map. 

But specifically, it has been a really effective platform. It is relative small, about 400 pounds. It largely just has the sensors. 

There are no weapons on it, but you don’t find too many BCTs that 

are executing any combat operations without having that thing 

overhead, especially on objective. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you very much. 

That is all I have. 

Dr. WENSTRUP. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, gentlemen, for being here today. 

Mr. Pennington, I have a question for you. On the domestic debate, the question of privacy, of course, comes up. And as I understand, the FAA will have responsibility over the commercial requirements for that, and I am curious who has the responsibility 

within the military, and what are some of the proposals for privacy 

protection for our citizens? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. So there is—Congressman, a great question. In 

the military, there is a longstanding prohibition, as you know, for 

any gathering of intelligence on Americans in the U.S. 

So we have various sensors on manned and unmanned aircraft 

that we use all the time in training. We have very clear prohibitions on the utilization of that data for anything other than military purposes, which is to train. And likewise, we have very clear 

standards on how you have to maintain the data and dispose of it. 

And so, the FAA and then certainly Department of Justice and 

others have got to think through similar questions about how we 

do UAS, private or civil UAS. But I would tell you that we have 
14 

a fair body of law on how we handle airborne aircraft currently, 

whether they are rotary wing or fixed wing and whether they are 

first responders, public, or whether they happen to be private vehicles. 

We have a fair body of law that explains what you can and cannot do with that data. So I think that might be a useful place to 

start. 

Dr. WENSTRUP. Thank you very much. 

Colonel Tierney, the Army is looking into the Gray Eagle as unmanned vehicle. How is that different from the Air Force’s Predator? 

Colonel TIERNEY. Similar when you look on them, look at them 

out on a ramp. It is really the task and purpose, and then there 

are some design changes. The task and purpose that the Army is 

using its Gray Eagle for is, well, the acronym, RSTA—reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition. It is really the fix and 

finish capability that is organic to the division, the two-star commander formation that basically gives his eyes on the battlefield. 

The reason it is different is our philosophy on how we are going 

to fly them and fight them. From a flying perspective, the Gray 

Eagle, again, there is no stick and rudder component of a trained 

pilot that is manning it. It is completely automated for takeoff and 

landing. 

So our operators are all enlisted soldiers that know how to operate the ground control station, but we have not run anybody 

through flight training. So our ability to train is—how we train is 

significantly different. 

Also the design is it is not a—while it is GPS [global positioning 

system] capable, we are principally operating on line of sight. So 

either from a satellite-denied environment, we simply don’t have 

the signal, that is really not in effect. Line of sight is its principal 

way that it is going to operate. So that is two differences. 

And then, lastly, it is the integration into the division. I mean, 

this really for the Army is such a game-changer. Really, since GPS 

navigation and night vision, is the biggest leap forward for us that 

have become so integral to how we fight. We could no more go in 

with a borrowed M–4 than we could with a borrowed aircraft. 

So guys counting on that aircraft being overhead is really critical, and then the ability to train with that. And perhaps later, we 

can talk more about how we are training our own manned fleets, 

how they are going together. 

But it is the design, the task purpose, how it will be used, that 

makes those differences. And while they all started from a joint design, and there is a lot of commonalities in terms of how they are 

working with the ground control station, frequency bands, et 

cetera, that task purpose that is uniquely for the Army and for 

those divisions is why it is different in some aspects from the Predator or Reaper. 

Dr. WENSTRUP. So it is more adapted for ground missions? 

Colonel TIERNEY. Absolutely. 

Dr. WENSTRUP. Thank you, Colonel. 

Mr. TURNER. We will go to our second round. 

Colonel, one of the exciting applications that people discuss with 

UASs and UAVs is manned/unmanned teaming, which would ex-
15 

pand the breadth of both the pilot’s reach and those that are working with a deployed system. Could you talk about that for a moment and what some of the areas that you see that might be 

gained from that, and how that might evolve as we look to what 

this emerging area of UAVs and UASs? 

Colonel TIERNEY. Yes, sir. That specific capability is probably the 

biggest game-changer, at least for the Army, how that integrates. 

And what we call that manned/unmanned teaming is that partnership between a manned aircraft, let us say an Apache attack helicopter, and the unmanned aircraft that is overhead. And there is 

a wide range of abilities that we have been able to incorporate. 

From a technical aspect, we have called all the way to Level 4 

control, but especially in our line-of-sight configuration, for example, the front-seater in an Apache can take control of the aircraft 

and move it to get that lag between a pilot at a remote station so 

that he can physically take flight control and get it positioned 

where he needs to. 

The next level is that he can control the sensor so that if he sees 

something, he is trying to instead of relay that from person to person, he can control that. So you can see where it does exactly what 

you said, sir. It really extends that pilot’s reach. 

But what we are finding, the real game-changer that we didn’t 

expect is that having—having that Gray Eagle up overhead and 

allow you to husband those more expensive, maintenance-intensive 

airplanes in terms of like an Apache. So when you actually need 

it to go do its job with a 22-hour orbit time of a Gray Eagle, it can 

be over monitoring and then, when you need to, bring those attack 

platforms forwards. 

Recently, within the last 10 months at the national training center, the observer controllers’ comments were when Gray Eagle is 

overhead, it is not a fair fight. That the guys have figured out how 

to work the system, for example, sitting on a ramp 60 kilometers 

away looking at the image of the—this is the Op 4 in a training 

environment. They are able to see where the tanks are located and 

had a really smart front-seat Apache co-pilot gunner, used to be an 

artilleryman. So we don’t even need to launch. 

Call the coordinates in—and in this training scenario, called the 

coordinates in and didn’t even need to launch. Frustrated the observer controllers. They said, well, that is cheating. You guys have 

to launch to actually get—so they pulled up 8 kilometers or 6 kilometers within the range of the Hellfire missile. And again, never 

actually saw them with human eye but knew where the targets 

were at. 

And those are the type of changes that are occurring. Instead of 

staying up for hours and hours and putting a man at risk either 

from fatigue, you know, you are flying guys 130, 140 hours a 

month, or risk to enemy fire, you can balance that and really allow 

yourself to have those aircraft available from the guy on the 

ground says, ‘‘I need you to get here now with weapons,’’ that aircraft is always available. 

So that is a couple ways. But from the Army’s perspective, it is 

really going to be a game-changer to include reducing the number 

of aircraft that we have to keep up, manned aircraft, up and flying 

day in and day out. 
16 

Mr. TURNER. Excellent. Thank you. 

And as we all know, we don’t want it to be a fair fight. 

Colonel TIERNEY. No. 

Mr. TURNER. So thank you for that description. 

Colonel TIERNEY. Yes, sir. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. TURNER. Mr. Pennington, when we talk about trying to 

achieve this cooperation between the FAA and DOD, we do so because we know that DOD has been on the lead front of research 

and development, design, application of UAV technology, sensors, 

and technology maturation. They have also, obviously, from their 

utilization of UASs and UAVs been on the forefront of acquisition, 

working with industry to assure that they can achieve the end 

result. 

And then in integration. I mean, when we talk about integrating 

them into our airspace, DOD has already been very active in both 

in foreign application, but also in war zones for the integration of 

multiple layers of both private military aircraft that are manned 

and UAVs and UASs. 

And then, of course, there is the issue of deployment and ensuring that the operation, the skills that are necessary for operation, 

that they are developed and utilized. As we try to go toward this 

cooperation, obviously, Air Force Research Laboratories are a significant resource that we are trying to leverage in this. 

Could you please speak for a moment as to how you can see this 

asset of the Air Force Research Laboratories being leveraged 

through this process of DOD and the integration with FAA? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Congressman, great question. I think there are 

two things, and Dyke touched on one of them. So I will spend a 

little less time on that. 

Sense and avoid is the—there are two critical issues. One is 

sense and avoid. The second one is how you maintain a secure link 

between the aircraft and the ground site. So, in sense and avoid, 

AFRL has been leading the discussion, along with our friends in 

the AFMC [Air Force Materiel Command], LCMC [Life Cycle Management Command] in terms of a customer Global Hawk or another vehicle for how do we actually do it. 

Do we use EO [electro-optical]? Do we use IR [infrared]? Do we 

use radar? You could use all of them. And then, secondly, building 

an algorithm which would accept these inputs and then provide 

info to the pilot. And then, eventually, as you move down the automation and autonomy lane, it also begins to be—it provides it directly into the aircraft and notifies the air traffic system that it 

needs to turn right or left or climb or descend to avoid a potential 

collision. 

So sense and avoid is the first key piece. The second key piece 

is the fact that we have the aircraft displaced from the cockpit, 

which is on the ground, which is referred to as the ground control 

station. So we must make sure that we utilize what DOD, and particularly, it has been AFRL, along with Rome Labs, in looking at 

information integrity, assurance, and security. 

And the same applies, as you know, or you have seen a couple 

articles in the last weeks about potential vulnerabilities of current 

aircraft avionic suites to what is referred to as hacking or cyber at-
17 

tacks. Certainly, a GCS [ground control station] that is separated 

from the aircraft, like we do in the UASs, is something that we 

must pay attention to this issue of information integrity assurance 

and security. 

Mr. TURNER. And then, for each of you, this is a budgetary hearing. How is it that we can look forward to 2014 and our budgetary 

priorities and the emerging opportunities of UASs and UAVs. So I 

am going to ask each of you, if you will, to provide us a commercial 

of what are we underfunding? 

As you look to overall what is available, what the opportunities 

are, what are we missing? What is an area that perhaps we need 

to pay better attention to that might have incredible opportunities 

for us? 

I will start with Mr. Weatherington. 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Chairman Turner, you have heard this before, but I will say the number-one risk to the DOD unmanned aircraft portfolio and probably ISR in general is the budgetary uncertainty that DOD currently faces. We are facing that certainly in fiscal year 2013 with working the sequestration. 

As you are well aware, the 2014 budget was delivered, but there 

is still a big question mark as to what that budget will actually end 

up being. And so, there is very much uncertainty in many program 

managers’ minds as to what resources they are actually going to 

have in 2013 and 2014. 

Unfortunately, that leads us to be conservative, and in the short 

term, DOD is forced to make some decisions that in the long term 

probably aren’t in the best interests of the Department, but we 

have no other alternative. 

So the major improvement we could make is stabilizing the budget, whatever that is. Then DOD could do a much better job of doing 

its long-term planning for whatever that budget will support. 

The next step is the threat continues to evolve. You can pick up 

a newspaper almost any day and hear about some new activity 

somewhere around the world. It is very much different than when 

I was in a blue uniform, and we kind of knew who the bad guy 

was. And virtually all of our resources were dedicated against that 

threat, and we had a really good idea what the fight was going to 

be and where it was going to be and how we were going to fight 

it. 

Today, we have a much more diverse threat, and that presents 

DOD some significant challenges, both in what the specific capabilities we are to address that threat and how much of each kind 

of capability we can afford. In the building today, we are going 

through a significant reevaluation of the Department’s long-term 

strategy and how ISR supports those various mission capabilities 

that we have to execute. 

In the short term, you see that reflected a little bit in the fiscal 

year 2014 budget, the President’s budget request, because we are 

still trying to figure that out. So I am sorry I can’t be more specific 

than that. 

In terms of unmanned aircraft systems specifically, I would articulate that the systems we have designed are going to be around 

for a long time. We built in a lot of flexibility into these systems. 
18 

Someone mentioned earlier in the conference today that we are flying 30- and 40-year-old airplanes, and unfortunately, that is true. 

The advantage we have in the unmanned aircraft systems portfolio is it is a relatively new and healthy and young portfolio, and 

we have built a lot of investment into it that allows us to integrate 

new capabilities into it very quickly. So I find that those systems 

are going to likely be the most adaptable we have. 

The other advantage is they are relatively inexpensive to operate, compared to other legacy systems we have. Now have to be 

very careful when we start making comparisons between manned 

systems and unmanned systems because the unmanned systems 

were procured for a specific mission set that in most cases you cannot find an equivalent to in the manned world. 

But I will use a simple example. Colonel Tierney mentioned 

Shadow. Previous to the Army having Shadow, the way we did that 

reconnaissance was with a manned rotary-wing asset, you know, 

Kiowa, Blackhawk, and Apache. Those systems, compared to a 

Shadow, are 10 times more expensive to operate than a Shadow. 

Now Shadow doesn’t do everything they do, but if what you need 

is risk-to-capability or ISR capability, that is exactly what you 

want to use because you keep those resource-intensive assets on 

the ground, and you save them for when you really need to use 

them. 

Likewise, the Air Force in Predator and Reaper. Those systems are relatively inexpensive to operate. Operating costs in the $3,000 

to $4,000 a flight hour compared to other manned systems. And 

again, not equivalent, but an F–16 is in the $25,000 to $30,000 an 

hour price range. 

So, again, if you can use—if those systems of Predator, Reaper 

are what you need to accomplish a mission and you can leave your 

F–16 parked on the ground, then that is a good thing for the Department to do. 

Mr. TURNER. Very well said. The issue of uncertainty, both 

through sequestration, the era of repeated continuing resolutions, 

brinksmanship legislative budgeting and spending, it certainly has 

had its significant effects on DOD and the industry. We hear it everywhere we go. 

Certainly, Secretary Hagel made that point when he was just before our committee. So very well said. 

Mr. Pennington. 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Dyke has laid out very clearly what the challenges are. I would like to just focus on some potential opportunities, which if we can keep them in the budget I think will make 

both the military public users and the civil users better off in the 

future. 

I talked about sense and avoid. Dyke talked about ground-based 

sense and avoid. Ground-based sense and avoid is the near-term 

opportunity certainly for Federal public users, but potentially for 

civil users, to dramatically expand access to the National Airspace 

System. 

So if you have an ASR–11, if you have some other sensor that 

is relatively high resolution with a C–2 system and you go through 

the appropriate testing, in that body of airspace, you can begin to 

fly UASs much more frequently. And that certainly is a capability 
19 

that we in DOD think is very important, but also I think that it 

is going to be something that the test sites and other civil proponents in the future will think is important. 

Longer term, airborne sense and avoid is the way to go certainly 

for larger aircraft, where you have the size, weight, and power 

available to be able to have that onboard. And a lot of that research is going on right here in the Dayton area. So that sort of 

not just research, but also application. Moving it into a vehicle is 

important. 

Now why do I mention that, that it is not just a DOD, but it is 

a civil side? The way to open the civil market is to be able to answer what Dyke talked about in see and avoid. Well, part of see 

and avoid, we believe, is that if you can get the sense and avoid 

and you have an agreed-upon certified solution set, then civil proponents could work with the FAA and their local community and 

say that this is the radar we have, this is the testing we have done 

of the radar, and this is how it meets the standards. 

And within the framework of that, we should begin to operate. 

And then, secondly, airborne sense and avoid, as civil proponents 

begin to put that on their aircraft, it should dramatically open up 

the places that you can use these. 

Why this is incredibly important to DOD is that if that happens, 

there will be a much broader civil market than there will be the 

military market, and the military will be able to choose from this 

competitive civil market, just like we do for cars and airplanes 

today. And we believe that it will be an advantage to us. We will 

have a greater variety of choice. 

Secondly, most likely, the prices will be lower. Thirdly, IR&D 

[independent research and development] will be being done by industry primarily, with a little bit of military help, where it is the 

opposite way around right now. 

So if we can kind of keep those sort of things secured in the 

budget, I think we will be better off both on the military side and, 

as Congressman LoBiondo works on his side, on the civil side. 

Mr. TURNER. Excellent reference to the dividend that this will 

pay. 

Colonel Tierney. 

Colonel TIERNEY. Sir, can I go down those questions? 

I guess from a fiscal perspective, in the near term for our UAS, 

it is our O&M [operations and management], our operations dollars 

available to operate them. In the Gray Eagle’s case, we have 

enough to acquire it, but not enough to fly it, which is problematic 

for an acquisition policy and law. If we can’t afford to use, we are 

not allowed to buy it. 

From a research and development perspective, we are kind of 

really at the dawn of this. You can kind of think of jet fighters 

when they first came around, how many iterations went by that 

there is still a lot to learn. And as that budget shrinks, it is just 

less opportunity we have to improve it, to really take advantage of 

what it is capable of. 

From a threat perspective, when we talked about could they have 

been shot down or what are the threats against them is really from 

an enemy, a direct action against us, we are able to task organize 

how we fight to not afford that opportunity, either from greater 
20 

standoff distance of the sensors, by either closing with and throwing our smalls at them. So you are throwing a mosquito size or relative small UAS, and they are trying to swat it with a sledgehammer. 

I think it is not that direct action. The threat we have to be concerned about is a network penetration from a cyber attack against 

a UAS system that is well integrated, but basically is vulnerable 

in that regard. 

And the last point, I think that when you said where are those 

opportunities as we transition commercially? I think from the 

Army’s perspective, you can see a lot of tactical to practical applications—be it civilian like Medevac or telemedicine or night vision— 

that are applied. 

You can see that we are rapidly approaching the ability, once the 

airspace issues are worked out, everything from the surveillance 

missions we are doing on some type of screen line look very similar 

to an oil pipeline, any type of infrastructure, those type of techniques. And while you said we couldn’t necessarily materially support some of the efforts, the lessons we have learned, there is already a great history of the Army transitioning those lessons back 

to civilian application. 

Mr. TURNER. Thank you. 

Turning to Mr. Cook. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 

Once again, I am going to show my ignorance on this, but maybe 

you can help me through this. And this is on the data link, and 

you kind of alluded to it earlier. I have these visions, and I am always looking at the enemy, how they are going to counteract this. 

Of course, the old days, it would just be called ‘‘jamming.’’ Now 

it is much more sophisticated. If you invest, if you change the battlefield, where you are going to rely upon these systems and not 

human individuals, but actually how reliable or what is the possibility of that being interfered with so that they cannot function and 

carry out their tactical missions? 

Colonel TIERNEY. We are mandated to now everything is the 

TCDL [tactical common data link] or technical. It is communication 

data link is secure. There is no more unsecure that can be, in theory, jammed in there without some effort. 

The lost link capability when the aircraft doesn’t see what signal 

it is supposed to be, that it doesn’t go do what somebody says it 

is to do, it comes home. 

When we did—related to this were the analysis of alternatives 

for the Armed Aerial Scout, the Scout helicopter, the OH–58. When 

we looked at what is its successor, the analysis of alternatives 

showed that it was a combination, manned/unmanned teaming. So 

that we retain the ability to do both. 

We can’t always presume that we are going to win every battle 

so that the airfield that you lose and the UAVs don’t have any 

place to land, that we have kind of thought through that. So, specifically, when you say how will we get when that battlefield changer occurs, when will be the counteraction to that, is we still see 

that there is that requirement for the manned system out there so 

that we can put the appropriate tool for the appropriate task when 

necessary. 
21 

Mr. COOK. Colonel Tierney, on that same vein, I guess, you briefly mentioned cyber threats, cyber attack. Could you discuss that a 

little bit, the risk of a cyber threat as it pertains to these systems? 

Colonel TIERNEY. Well, just like any network system that is 

linked, just what is that penetration capability, penetration detection, the penetration defense of any network? And so, for example, 

the feeds, the products that we get back from there, like say, for 

example, full-motion video. But then that is fed and distributed out 

to all the users across the division, the brigade combat teams, 

down to the battalion. 

So that travels along a network. So there is certainly a risk there 

that that could be either interfered with or stolen, like any other 

kind of data. 

There is the other part against what you just said, sir, about that 

where you called it weakening or jamming, that what are we doing 

to protect that? So you can’t spoof the aircraft and let it think it 

is the signal it is receiving and basically turn it back on it. 

So, again, it is those abilities to encrypt it, to defend against it, 

and then just be aware across a larger spectrum with the Army is 

that how well protected are our networks. And as these outliers, 

these Scout aircraft are on the edge of this network, that they are 

not a vulnerability. We recognize that it has to be protected, and 

it is built that way from the ground up, not so much as an afterthought in particular with the technical communication data link 

that is secure to each one of those. 

Mr. COOK. Thank you very much, Colonel. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield. 

Mr. TURNER. Well, I want to thank each of our panelists—Mr. 

Weatherington, Mr. Pennington, Colonel Tierney—not only for your 

being here, but also for your expertise. 

I mean, clearly, this is a very important area for our national security and then also for a domestic economic opportunity. Your 

thoughtfulness, your expertise will help us make better decisions 

and ensure that we make the right ones as we go forward. 

So also, then thank you for being here today and contributing 

your comments to this forum and for the interest that we have in 

the community. 

I also want to thank then our Members of Congress for being 

here. Frank LoBiondo, Paul Cook, and Brad Wenstrup, thank you 

for being here. 

I wanted to note that there are many initiatives that are congressional led versus bureaucracy led or agency led. This is one of 

those. This is one where Congress has stepped in and said we need 

to make a mark here. We need to integrate this opportunity. We 

need to make certain that the parties are working together. 

If it had not been for Congress leaning forward on this issue, we 

would still be talking about the prospects of the day upon which 

we begin this process. Instead, by Congress leaning forward, we are 

beginning that process now. 

I want to congratulate Frank LoBiondo for his leadership both on 

the Transportation Committee and the Armed Services Committee 

in bringing those issues together, and I appreciate his cooperation 

and being able to work with him on this important issue. 
22 

As we look at the potential for these six test sites, another aspect 

of this which is exciting is learning of all of the inherent expertise 

that we have across the country. People have been thinking about 

this and have been working on these issues for a significant period 

of time, and I think that inventiveness, that ingenuity that is going 

to be unleashed by this first step of these test sites will lead us to 

the day where we are not even just in test sites, but we actually 

look at how is this applied across our Nation in our domestic airspace and what it has accomplished. And part of that will have 

begun by the information that you provide us today. So I appreciate that. 

I also want to thank everyone for participating, and certainly the 

members of our community for their diligence on the issue of how 

then can our region take advantage of the assets that we have at 

Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the engineers and scientists that 

are here, and the inventive spirit of our community and apply it 

to both our national interests in UAS and UAVs, but also for a 

local economic development opportunity. 

And with that, we will be adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:37 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 
A P P E N D I X 

APRIL 23, 2013 

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD 

APRIL 23, 2013 

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WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING 

THE HEARING 

APRIL 23, 2013 

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RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. COOK 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. There are a variety of causes for Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) mishaps to include pilot error, equipment problems and weather, to 

name a few of the causes. Essentially, these causes are not fundamentally different 

than those we observe with manned aircraft. Consequently, the overall mishap rates 

between manned and unmanned systems are comparable both in terms of the actual 

numbers and the trends. 

According to the Air Force, mishaps that result in damage greater than $2M, a 

destroyed aircraft, or a fatality are referred to as Class A mishaps and the Air Force 

tracks the rate of these mishaps per 100,000 flight hours. Over the last 10 years, 

the average annual Class A mishaps rate is about 6 unmanned aircraft systems per 

100,000 flight hours. At this point last year, the Air Force has had 10 Class A mishaps, for a rate of about 5.5. To date this year, the Air Force had 6 Class A mishaps 

and a corresponding rate drop to 3 mishaps per 100,000 flight hours. 

Unmanned aircraft system mishap rates continue to trend down. This curve mirrors the historical mishap rate for manned aircraft; the slope is almost identical. 

[See page 11.] 

QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING 

APRIL 23, 2013 

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QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. TURNER 

Mr. TURNER. Are combatant commands other than CENTCOM asking for Wide 

Area Motion Imagery capabilities to support their missions? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. In general, many combatant commanders other than 

CENTCOM have recognized the tremendous value in wide-area surveillance capabilities in providing persistent visual coverage of large areas of interest and improving overall situational awareness of the battlefield. Therefore, the Department has 

seen growing interest in obtaining wide-area surveillance capabilities, to include 

Wide Area Motion Imagery. 

Mr. TURNER. How would the elimination of funding for the Gorgon Stare program 

affect CENTCOM’s ability to conduct operations in FY14 and beyond, as well as 

other combatant commands you just identified beginning in FY15? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The Air Force has provided CENTCOM with required Wide 

Area Motion Imagery (WAMI) capabilities to answer the Wide Area Surveillance 

Joint Urgent Operational Needs (JUON) Statement, which was subsequently closed 

on March 12, 2013. Gorgon Stare Increment 1 successfully delivered one orbit of 

WAMI capability (4 sensor pod sets, modified MQ–9 aircraft, and ground exploitation component), which deployed in 3QFY11 in support of CENTCOM requirements. Gorgon Stare Increment 2 completes developmental and operational testing 

in 4QFY13 and will be available for immediate fielding. Increment 2 will ultimately 

deliver two additional orbits of WAMI (6 sensor pods sets, new modified MQ–9 aircraft, and a new ground exploitation component), with significant improvements in 

sensor resolution and overall field of regard. Eliminating Gorgon Stare RDT&E and 

Procurement funding would not impact the Air Force’s ability to meet CENTCOM’s 

documented requirements or the fully funded Increment 2 enhancements. However, 

eliminating the procurement funding reduces available spares for current operations 

and planned capability enhancements beyond currently documented requirements. 

Mr. TURNER. A large fraction of the DOD UAS inventory is Group 1 systems. 

What are the capabilities these systems provide and why has DOD procured such 

a large number? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The Joint UAS CONOPS describes Group 1 UAS as weighing less than 20 pounds, normally operated at altitudes below 1200 feet aboveground-level and at speeds less than 100 nautical miles per hour. Group 1 UAS are 

hand-launched, small aircraft with electro-optical and infra-red sensors for close-in 

reconnaissance and situational awareness, are man-portable (can be carried in a 

ruck sack) or man-packable (put into the back of a vehicle), and can provide an organic (tactical level) lethal strike capability. The systems are affordable, have a 

small footprint, provide the warfighter a critical tactical level of ISR capability, require no dedicated manpower, and ultimately save lives. All the Military Departments and SOCOM operate Group 1 systems, and they are procured off common 

contracts where appropriate. 

Mr. TURNER. GAO recently released a report on Reducing Fragmentation, Overlap, and Duplication within Government. What is the Department doing within the 

UAS portfolio to gain efficiencies and reduce duplication? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The Department’s goal is to provide the needed joint 

warfighting capabilities in a cost effective and efficient manner. Commonality, interoperability, and affordability are key attributes considered in the development, procurement, and sustainment of affordable and effective UAS capabilities. The Military Departments are required to analyze requirements utilizing the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System (JCIDS) process. The JCIDS process supports the acquisition process by identifying and assessing capability needs and associated performance criteria to be used as the basis for acquiring the right capabilities. If these capabilities can be achieved through commonality, the Department will 

choose the common approach. 

Mr. TURNER. What do unmanned aircraft bring to the table that manned aircraft 

cannot contribute? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The capabilities of unmanned systems are not unique compared to manned systems. Weapon systems produce effects in nearly all domains, 

independent of being manned or unmanned. It is important to highlight there are 
62 

no requirements for unmanned systems within the Joint force, but there are requirements that are better fulfilled by unmanned systems. Unmanned systems provide persistence, versatility, survivability, and reduced risk to human life, and in 

many cases are the preferred alternatives especially for missions that are characterized as dull, dirty, or dangerous. With that mindset, unmanned systems are being 

optimized for these dull, dirty, or dangerous missions: 

• Dull missions are ideal for unmanned systems because they involve long-duration undertakings with mundane tasks that are ill-suited for manned systems. 

Good examples are surveillance missions that involve prolonged observation. 

Unmanned systems currently fulfill a wide variety of ‘‘dull’’ mission sets, and 

the number will increase in all domains as unmanned systems capabilities improve. Unmanned systems routinely operate for up to 28 hours on a single mission. 

• Dirty missions have the potential to unnecessarily expose personnel to hazardous conditions. A primary example is chemical, biological, and nuclear detection missions. Unmanned systems can perform these dirty missions with no risk 

of exposure to the operators. 

• Dangerous missions involve high risk. With advances in capabilities in performance and automation, unmanned systems will reduce the exposure risk to personnel by increasingly fulfilling capabilities that are inherently dangerous. 

Mr. TURNER. How does the cost of UAS and manned aircraft compare in: a. Manning b. Total O&M (not just per flight hour)? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The Department has conducted a number of comparisons of 

cost between UAS and manned aircraft. While the results have been somewhat 

mixed, there are several findings that have persisted in our studies. 

First, capability drives complexity and cost. This theme applies to development, 

procurement, and operating (O&M) costs. In general, more capable systems are 

more complex, take longer to develop, and cost more to procure and operate regardless of whether they are manned or unmanned. It can be difficult to compare common manned and unmanned attributes across platforms, but capabilities-based decisions can still be made. 

Second, in most cases, a direct cost comparison between UAS and manned aircraft 

is difficult because the operating environments and capabilities are fundamentally 

different. Using the Global Hawk and U–2 as an example again, the Global Hawk 

flies a mission that is three times the length of a U–2 mission. Supporting that mission requires three full-workday shifts of manpower—significantly more on a persortie basis, but on par from an ‘‘hours on station’’ basis. 

That said, manning requirements for UAS are roughly comparable to manned aircraft with similar missions and capabilities. Likewise, O&M costs for comparable 

systems are similar with the exception that in some cases UAS may require less 

in flight training hours. We have made some initial looks at O&M cost per ‘‘hour 

on station’’, but have found those metrics to be inconclusive as they are highly dependent on assumptions intended to level the differences between the missions of 

the unmanned and manned systems. For comparison purposes, the operational cost 

per flight hour is $3,725 for MQ–1 Predator and $4,196 for MQ–9 Reaper, a more 

capable system. 

Mr. TURNER. How does sortie generation of manned and unmanned aircraft compare? In figuring total cost to the government, are the lower costs of acquiring UAS 

offset by a higher sortie rate? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. According to the Air Force, the monthly sortie generation 

rate (sorties per month per unit possessed aircraft) for the manned aircraft is 14.3 

and for unmanned aircraft is 8.3. However, there is no clear comparison of sortie 

generation rates between manned and unmanned aircraft due to the significantly 

different capabilities and missions. Unmanned aircraft focus on long duration, intelligence gathering missions supported by professionals who launch, recover, and 

maintain the aircraft and exploit and disseminate the data collected. In contrast, 

most manned aircraft mission sets are rarely set up to be purely intelligence gathering missions and provide an entirely different capability set including shorter-endurance missions such as suppression of enemy air defenses, close air support, interdiction and air superiority. Acknowledging the mission differences, in order to provide the same duration presence for a given mission, manned aircraft would have 

to generate more sorties than unmanned aircraft. This does not necessarily make 

an unmanned aircraft inherently less expensive than manned aircraft, although requiring fewer sorties to accomplish a mission can influence cost (scenario- and platform-dependent). 

Mr. TURNER. Understanding that UAV missions are often longer duration, can 

you compare operational availability rates? 
63 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. According the Air Force, for Fiscal Year 2013, Aircraft 

Availability (AA) rate for manned aircraft is 66 percent, while the AA rate for unmanned aircraft is 78 percent. Specifically, the MQ–1 AA rate is 79.8 percent, MQ– 

9 rate is 80.1 percent, and RQ–4 rate is 61.4 percent. 

Mr. TURNER. Air Force officials have stated that it takes around 140 personnel 

to mount an ‘‘unmanned’’ Predator mission. How does that compare to, say, a comparable F–16 mission? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. When comparing the required manpower between remotely 

piloted aircraft and F–16s, the differences in mission profiles between the systems 

should be noted. Both the MQ–1/9 and the F–16 provide extremely critical and valuable capabilities to our warfighters. Unmanned aircraft, such as the Predator, focus 

on long duration, intelligence gathering missions supported by professionals who 

launch, recover, and maintain the aircraft and exploit and disseminate the data collected. In contrast, a manned F–16 mission set is rarely set up to be purely an intelligence gathering mission and provides an entirely different capability set including 

missions such as suppression of enemy air defenses, close air support, interdiction 

and air superiority. In Operation Enduring Freedom for example, the F–16 flies an 

approximate 6 hour sortie and is typically tasked to directly support ground forces 

with immediate close air support. The Predator is typically tasked with a long duration sortie of nearly 22 hours, during which an intelligence team continuously exploits mission data real-time. 

According to the Air Force, a Predator mission involves approximately 140 to 206 

personnel, including aircrews, maintenance support, and intelligence personnel, to 

provide a near-continuous combat air patrol for a year. Nearly 40 percent of this 

number of personnel is used to process, exploit, and disseminate intelligence data. 

Comparatively, an F–16 squadron deployment (typically 18 aircraft) includes approximately 400 operations and maintenance personnel to support daily operations 

for a typical deployment of 90–120 days. However, due to the vastly different missions between the F–16 and the Predator, there is no accurate methodology to directly compare manning requirements. 

Mr. TURNER. What types of performance metrics should we be looking at to evaluate the cost effectiveness of the different air assets? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. In general, the metrics the Department uses to analyze and 

evaluate weapons systems fall into three major categories: effectiveness metrics, cost 

metrics, and support/sustainability metrics. The specific metrics used, especially 

when it comes to effectiveness, are highly dependent upon the warfighting capability 

the weapon system is intended to satisfy. For example, we would choose to look at 

endurance for an ISR aircraft whereas we may choose to look at range and capacity 

for a cargo or mobility aircraft. There are no specific established performance 

metrics that can be used to directly evaluate UAS against manned aircraft for effectiveness or cost effectiveness. However, there are consistent themes that show up 

in our analyses that can indicate where UAS are attractive or unattractive for a 

given mission or capability. In general, UAS are attractive alternatives in the following cases: 

• Complexity is low 

• Performance would be limited by physiology (such as long endurance, high ‘‘g’’, 

or the presence of chemical, biological or nuclear agents) 

• Risk/acceptable risk may be high 

In contrast, a manned aircraft solution would be the most attractive alternative 

where: 

• Mission is significantly complex (involving inflight retasking and/or autonomous 

decision making) 

• The aircraft is intended to carry strategic weapons or passengers 

Mr. TURNER. Not too long ago, UAS had a much higher accident rate than 

manned aircraft. What is the current safety record of UAS, and how does it compare 

to manned aircraft and aerostats? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. Mishaps that result in damage greater than $2M, a destroyed aircraft, or a fatality are referred to as Class A mishaps and we track the 

rate of these mishaps per 100,000 flight hours. With respect to the Air Force, over 

the last 10 years, the average annual Class A mishaps rate is about 6 unmanned 

aircraft systems per 100,000 flight hours. At this point last year, we’d had 10 Class 

A mishaps, for a rate of about 5.5. To date this year, we’ve had 6 Class A mishaps 

and a corresponding rate drop to 3 mishaps per 100,000 flight hours. 

Unmanned aircraft system mishap rates continue to trend down. This curve mirrors the historical mishap rate for manned aircraft; the slope is almost identical. 

Mr. TURNER. Annual procurement of UAS has gone from 1,211 in fiscal 2012 to 

288 last year to just 54 in the proposed FY14 budget. What are the procurement 
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plans for future UASs? Does an increase in quantities depend for a new generation 

of capabilities? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The Department’s FY2014 budget supports a broad spectrum of ISR capabilities and largely sustains those systems and capabilities acquired over the past 10 years. We have acquired a tremendous amount of ISR capability over the past 10 years—the large majority of those assets are supporting our 

current operations in Afghanistan. As we draw down, some of those assets will likely be reallocated to other needs across the globe, but many of them will continue 

to support the current and evolving counter-terrorism mission. 

For future UAS, the Department already has plans to leverage UAS to provide 

enhanced maritime surveillance capability and to enhance aircraft carrier 

versatility. The MQ–4C Triton will enter operational service in 2017 to work as a 

maritime surveillance asset alongside the P–8A Poseidon. Shortly afterwards the 

Department plans to field the initial carrier-based UAS capability with the Unmanned Carrier Launched Surveillance and Strike System (UCLASS). 

Future procurement quantities of UAS are always driven by strategy and associated requirements for capability and capacity. With that in mind, for UAS to remain 

a valuable tool in the Department’s arsenal, we need to continue to make progress 

solving today’s tough technical challenges: ability to operate in unsegregated airspace, communications, and increasing levels of automation and/or autonomy. 

Mr. TURNER. Does the procurement goal for UAVs still include a 65-orbit requirement? With the withdrawal from Afghanistan, on what is that requirement based? 

Mr. WEATHERINGTON. The Department’s Fiscal Year 2014 budget request continues to support the achievement of 65 combined MQ–1 and MQ–9 orbits, otherwise referred to as Combat Air Patrols (CAPS), and based on our continuing need 

to support counterterrorism operations and other global requirements for Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR). Currently, the vast majority of our 

CAPS today are in Afghanistan, and therefore, there are numerous unfulfilled requirements across the globe, awaiting available assets. The Department is continuing to assess its ISR requirements post-Afghanistan in light of the new defense 

strategy to determine the required force structure and capability for this class of unmanned systems. 

Mr. TURNER. How would the elimination of funding for the Gorgon Stare program 

affect CENTCOM’s ability to conduct operations in FY14 and beyond, as well as 

other combatant commands you just identified beginning in FY15? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. The Air Force has already provided CENTCOM with required 

Wide-Area Motion Imagery (WAMI) capabilities to answer the Wide Area Surveillance Joint Urgent Operational Needs (JUON) Statement, which was consequently 

closed on 12 March 2013. Gorgon Stare Increment 1 successfully delivered one orbit 

of Wide-Area Motion Imagery (WAMI) capability (4x sensor pod sets, modified MQ– 

9 aircraft, and ground exploitation component), which deployed in 3QFY11 in support of CENTCOM JUON requirements. Gorgon Stare Increment 2 completes developmental and operational testing in 4QFY13 and will be available for immediate 

fielding. FY14 President’s Budget request freezes the Gorgon Stare program at Increment 2 configuration and terminates future RDT&E and Procurement funding. 

The FY14 President’s Budget request procures Gorgon Stare Increment 2 spares 

and sustains operation and maintenance funding for six Increment 2 pod sets (purchased with FY11 and FY12 funds) and two ground stations to ensure the capability 

remains available to Combatant Commands and global force management allocation. Increment 2 will ultimately deliver two additional orbits of WAMI (6x sensor 

pods sets, new modified MQ–9 aircraft, and a new ground exploitation component), 

with significant improvements in sensor resolution and overall field of regard. 

Mr. TURNER. DOD and the FAA have been negotiating access for UAS into the 

national airspace system for many years now. Where do negotiations stand on that 

and on the airspace rules for the six proposed test sites? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Through the Department of Defense (DOD) Policy Board on 

Federal Aviation (PBFA) and the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Task Force, the DOD has worked with the Federal 

Aviation Administration (FAA) to update the 2007 memorandum of agreement 

(MOA) between the DOD and FAA on UAS operations in the National Airspace System (NAS). The new MOA is expected to have final signature approval by the end 

of June, 2013. The MOA simplifies the certificate of authorization process for some 

operations. The DOD and FAA continue to work together through UAS Executive 

Committee working groups to explore other options to increase NAS access (e.g. 

Class D Joint Use working group). The PBFA is also engaged with FAA through 

the Joint Planning and Development Office to establish a plan to meet the congressionally mandated 2015 UAS integration date. 
65 

While supportive of the test site concept, the DOD is not involved in the development of airspace rules in support of the potential test sites. The FAA is responsible 

for the development of test site requirements, rules and selection criteria. Questions 

on the test site process should be directed to the FAA. 

Mr. TURNER. In evaluating potential test sites and the flight rules under which 

they will operate, are there differences for where and how armed UAVs will be operated compared to unarmed systems? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. Department of Defense (DOD) has not been involved in the development of evaluation criteria or airspace rules for the potential test sites. Questions on the test site process should be directed to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). 

Regarding operation of armed and unarmed UAVs, DOD and FAA previously established procedures for UAS carrying weapons through the NAS to conduct weapons training. These flights are from DOD bases to ranges authorized for weapons 

release. The DOD has shared weapons carriage safety data and procedures with the 

FAA. There is no distinction within DOD on carriage of weapons between manned 

and unmanned aircraft; the same rigor, discipline, compliance and safety precautions are applied. 

Mr. TURNER. Are the evaluations of the test sites based on the requirements of 

current UAS technology? How do the requirements next-generation systems like 

UCLASS affect the site selection process? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. The Air Force and Department of Defense (DOD) uses restricted 

airspace to support DOD specific UAS technology development and testing. DOD 

has no plans to utilize the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) test sites for 

DOD UAS development, testing and evaluation requirements at this time. 

The DOD is not involved in the development of evaluation criteria for the potential test sites. The FAA is responsible for the development of test site requirements. 

Questions on the test site process should be directed to the FAA. 

A DOD representative will serve as an advisor to the Site Selection Evaluation 

Board (SSEB). Our representative will provide technical support and to assess proposals for potential impact to military installations and test and training operations 

to include next-gen systems to our ranges and Special Use Airspace. DOD fully anticipates the FAA will carefully consider negative impacts to military operations as 

well as impacts to private and commercial aviation during the selection process. The 

SSEB makes final decisions on test site selection. 

Mr. TURNER. Much of the domestic debate over UAV operations centers on questions of privacy. The FAA has been charged with considering the privacy aspects 

of commercial UAV operations. Who is responsible for developing privacy protections 

for military UAV operations inside the United States? 

Mr. PENNINGTON. For the United States Air Force, oversight of privacy protections 

associated with Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS)/Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) 

operations in domestic airspace is provided by the Deputy Chief of Staff, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance; the office of the Air Force Inspector General; and the office of the Air Force General Counsel. 

For Department of Defense (DOD) and Air Force ISR missions, privacy protections 

are enumerated by DOD Regulation 5240.1–R and Air Force Instruction (AFI) 14– 

104, which also includes specific guidance for UASs: 

‘‘AFI 14–104, 9.6.2. Air Force Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) operations, exercise and training missions will not conduct nonconsensual surveillance on specifically identified US persons, unless expressly approved by the Secretary of Defense, 

consistent with US law and regulations. Civil law enforcement agencies, such as the 

US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), US 

Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the US Coast Guard, will control 

any such data collected.’’ 

Mr. TURNER. We understand that Gray Eagle recently concluded its Initial Operational Test and Evaluation (IOT&E). Can you describe the results? 

Colonel TIERNEY. The Gray Eagle Unmanned Aircraft received an effective and 

suitable finding from Directorate of Operational Test and Evaluation. The Gray 

Eagle-equipped unit was rated effective at operating the MQ–1C system and has the 

potential to provide effective support to combat units. During the evaluation the aircraft successfully employed Hellfire missiles and demonstrated Level 4 interoperability with the AH–64E Apache helicopter which were shared requirements for 

both systems IOT&E. The unit also demonstrated its ability to meet its operational 

tempo—three continuous missions while maintaining an 81% operational readiness 

rating, satisfying the Sustainment Key Performance Parameter (KPP) requirement 

of 80 percent. The results confirm what we have witnessed in many years of combat 

that the system is appropriate for the Army’s needs. 
66 

Mr. TURNER. We understand that DOD is investing in Manned Unmanned 

Teaming. What does the Army expect to gain from Manned Unmanned Teaming? 

Colonel TIERNEY. The Army views Manned Unmanned Teaming (MUM–T) as 

more than just a situational awareness tool but as a method of maximizing the 

unique strengths of both our manned and unmanned aircraft fleets. Currently, the 

Army seamlessly moves full motion video/data between our Scout/Attack manned 

aircraft and unmanned aircraft. UAS traditionally operate at higher altitudes, with 

greater endurance, multiple mission sensors and often unobserved by the enemy. 

They also can assume more risk in mission execution as no personnel are placed 

in harm’s way. In turn our manned Scout/Attack aircraft are dynamic, provide the 

needed lower viewing angle, afford a greater lethal presence and have the ability 

to conduct more detailed reconnaissance. The result is an improved overall situational awareness, increased survivability for our manned aircraft, greater lethality 

and by reducing the complexity of target acquisition; we are able to dramatically 

reduce the time from acquisition through engagement. 

Mr. TURNER. The Army is continuing to acquire Grey Eagle UAS, which are similar to the Predator. Help us understand why the Army requires a different UAS, 

and why UAS of similar characteristics can’t be operated as joint assets. 

Colonel TIERNEY. To support the Ground Commander the Army requires a self 

contained, mobile, armed Unmanned Aircraft System capable of operating from austere locations, while not solely reliant on satellites for Command and Control. The 

competitively selected Gray Eagle, originally a joint effort between the Army and 

Air Force, incorporates lessons learned from 11 years of combat and leverages technology from both the Predator and Reaper programs. Far from duplicative, its missions are complementary, addressing capability gaps that could not otherwise be effectively closed by a single platform or mission. Just like one helicopter is not appropriate for all missions, neither is a single UAS. The robustness of the Gray Eagle 

UAS allows it to satisfy requirements for the General Purpose, Military Intelligence 

and Special Operation Forces. While all Aircraft are capable, of these three formations both the Military Intelligence and Special Operation Gray Eagle will be Joint 

Allocable through the ISR Global Force Management Process. 

Æ