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30 November 2006, 14:11
Lockheed Martin wins contract to develop high altitude airship for missile defense, other missions.
High Altitude Airship (HAA)
Lockheed Martin [NYSE: LMT] has received a contract for approximately $10 million to further develop advanced material technology and next-generation hull material for stratospheric airships under the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)’s Integrated Sensor Is Structure (ISIS) program.
Lockheed Martin Maritime Systems & Sensors, is developing a High Altitude Airship under a technology demonstration program funded the US Missile defense Agency. The unmanned, untethered solar powered prototype airship with be able to remain on station for 30 days at a cruise altitude of 60,000 feet. With a minimum payload capacity of 500 pounds and on-board supply of 3 kW of power the airship will be able to carry a missile detection and warning equipment augmenting current ground- and space-based capabilities. The current program cost is estimated at US $149 million with completion expected by November 2010. Lockheed Martin is already developing a larger prototype airship expected to carry 4,000 pound payloads and 10 KW power.
“The Lockheed Martin team was chosen to develop this innovative material based on the strength of its scientific and manufacturing expertise,” said DARPA program manager Tim Clark. “Once successfully demonstrated, the DARPA material will dramatically reduce the weight and size of airships while improving operational longevity and payload capacity.”
The High Altitude Airship (HAA) is developed under advanced technology concept demonstration (ACTD) $40 million design and risk reduction program. This prototype is expected to be completed in 2006. Once successfuly demonstrated in flight testing, the HAA is expected to provide a test bed for the Ballistic Missile defense Agency. The HAA will be about 500 feet long, 160 feet in diameter and have a volume of 5.2 million cubic feet.
The target HAA will be even larger. According to Lockheed Martin, the unmanned HAA 'blimp' is designed to operate for extended durations at an altitude of 65,000 feet, well above the flying altitude of aircraft or air defense missiles. The blimp's sensors will cover a ground and airspace footprint of at least 700 miles in diameter and more than 4 million cubic miles of airspace. HAA will be capable of lifting various mission-specific payloads, including radar, communications and passive electronic and imaging (EO/IR) sensors. Unlike satellites, HAA will be able to return to its base for resupply and refitting with different payloads, to accommodate evolving mission requirements. Using helium for lift and four electric-powered propulsion systems for directional flight and control, the HAA would maintain a quasi-geostationary position and have capacity to relocate. The ground-based command and control system will communicate with the airship via line-of-sight and beyond line-of-sight methods. Its vehicle management system will use autonomous, manual and remote-piloted modes, and will monitor vehicle health, perform systems diagnostics, control the system's operating environment at the equipment bays, and evaluate the hull structure.
“With Lockheed Martin’s substantial investment and legacy in airship materials development, we have already begun the process of creating a unique, highly-engineered, flexible composite hull material,” said David Filicky, Lockheed Martin’s ISIS advanced materials program manager. “This fabric requires significant materials development and large-scale, low –anomaly manufacturing process advancements over current state-of-the-art airship hull material. This contract allows us to advance our innovative fabrication process while addressing the ISIS flight environment requirements.”
A leader in airship and aerostat development, fabrication, systems integration and operations, Lockheed Martin has developed more than 300 airships and thousands of aerostats. Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor for the Missile Defense Agency’s High Altitude Airship, a stratospheric airship prototype, which will provide persistent surveillance along with other critical capabilities. The company also has provided tethered aerostat surveillance systems to both the U.S. Army for deployment in Iraq and to the U.S. Air Force to support air sovereignty and counter-drug operations along the southern U.S. border.
Some of the systems described include: Lockheed Martin’s Tethered Aerostat Radar, a helium-filled airship. Twice the size of the Goodyear Blimp, the airship is attached to the ground by a cable and can hover overhead, automatically monitoring any movement on the ground. These systems, which are being used to broadcast TV Marti to Cuba and to detect insurgents in Iraq, will have one significant weakness in the vast windswept desert areas along the border -- they cannot operate in high winds. This could be yet another government windfall for Lockheed Martin, which received $19.4 billion in Department of Defense contracts last year alone.
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