Fire-X vertical unmanned aircraft successfully completes first flight

Fire-X, a vertical unmanned air system (VUAS) developed by Northrop Grumman Corporation and Bell Helicopter completed its first fully autonomous flight at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona recently. The VUAS has been developed in less than one year’s time.

The VUAS can meet the growing needs for cargo and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities. Fire-X’s operational capabilities can be expanded to meet the emerging military requirements in all the Services and Special Operations Command of the US.

The first flight of the VUAS involved a short-duration hover to validate safe and reliable autonomous flight. Additional flight tests and reliability data gathering will be conducted in the coming weeks. Integration of ISR sensor payloads and cargo carrying capability test flights is set to occur early next year.

The expertise of Northrop Grumman in unmanned systems combined with Bell’s rotorcraft knowledge is what makes Fire-X successful. The first flight was accomplished in the eleventh month since development began. It was achieved by integrating Fire Scout’s proven autonomous systems developed for the US Navy with the highly successful Bell 407 helicopter, a FAA-certified helicopter that’s been in commercial service worldwide since 1996.