Contract Imminent for Unmanned Carrier-Baked Tinker Program.

• Author: Machi, Vivienne

A program that could revolutionize maritime warfare is about to enter its next phase as the Navy moves to launch unmanned tankers off of aircraft carriers within the next decade.

Once fielded, the MQ-25 Stingray will provide the service with a "robust, organic refueling capability to make better use of Navy combat strike fighters and extend the range of the carrier air wing with an increased fuel offload capability," Capt. Chad Reed, unmanned carrier aviation program manager told National Defense in an email.

Naval Air Systems Command is expected to award a fixed-price engineering, manufacturing and development contract to one of three competitors for the program--Boeing, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems or Lockheed Martin--by the end of this summer, less than a year after proposals were submitted.

The Navy plans to buy 76 aircraft, including four EMD systems to be procured across the service's five-year budget plan. Initial operating capability is currently expected in the mid-2020s.

The Stingray program comes on the heels of an earlier initiative to develop the unmanned carrier-launched airborne surveillance and strike, or UCLASS aircraft. That project was restructured in 2016 as stakeholders failed to agree on mission requirements. The Navy then settled on the current unmanned carrier aviation concept and dubbed the program MQ-25.

Boeing is offering a clean-sheet design that leverages the research and development that went into the UCLASS program, said Donald "BD" Gaddis, MQ-25 director at the company.

The prototype is ready to fly, company officials said at a recent media event at Boeing's facilities in St. Louis. It is designed to carry a 330-gallon fuel tank and a Cobham air refueling pod. Boeing has selected Rolls Royce's AE 3007 engine for the airplane, which is already installed on the Air Force's RQ-4 Global Hawk and the Navy's MQ-4C Triton unmanned aerial systems, Gaddis said.

Boeing invested its own money into the "T-1" flying prototype to reduce risk up front, he noted. "Normally you're talking about risk reduction for your [low-rate initial production] planes," he said. 'We have pushed that whole value equation way, way to the left."

The company began building the airplane in 2012 for its UCLASS proposal, and revealed it in 2014 as part of the preliminary design review stage of the program. Once the requirements morphed, "this prototype was right in the wheelhouse," Gaddis said.

General Atomics opted to go with a clean-sheet design for the MQ-25 that is similar to the company's Avenger developmental unmanned aerial...