The USN autonomous tanker aircraft, MQ-25, prototype had its first flight today from Mid-America/Scott AFB, IL (KBLV). Some good news for Boeing for a change.

https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2019/09/19/the-us-navys-new-autonomous-refueling-drone-takes-historic-first-flight/

https://youtu.be/YxDT-l3lZJs

Will be interesting. I had to go to Wikipedia to find it but the program goal is 15,000 lbs of fuel to give. That's not insubstantial these days of using Hornets as tankers.

I wonder what reserve that gives it on the ball? One would assume they are willing to accept a lot less passes than something with my pink heinie in it.

If, and there could be lots of reasons, it can't get aboard and the only tanker airborne is another MQ-25 can an MQ-25 tank and MQ-25? Pretty expensive to let it go in the water. Might also be a good capability if we ever have to do chainsaw or grid again 800 miles out to defend the task force.

The times are changing for sure.

Wikipedia says the program cost is $804M. With delivery of 72 aircraft, total program to run $13B, net $180M per aircraft. To put that in perspective, you can buy TWO F-18 Super Hornets (~$80M each) and have money left over for that unit cost.

That seems like a lot for what should be a pretty straightforward thing by modern standards.

I also worry this program will not actually deliver the practical benefits it is expected to.

Mike C.

That can be said of lots of military programs. It all depends on how many they end up producing. When I spoke with folks at Oshkosh about their F35 which was on display, the current unit cost is floating around $300M. But the plan is to leave them in production much longer than the F22 (thankfully) so the relative cost should drop over time.

Yup, but then you need a bunch more pilots for the F18s. Naval Aviators aren't cheap...

I suspect drone operators are a lot cheaper.

Robert

But it cost more to staff the MQ-25 team than the F-18 team. Pilots, techs, support folks, etc.

Mike C.

But it cost more to staff the MQ-25 team than the F-18 team. Pilots, techs, support folks, etc.

Mike C.

I’ve known many who were...and those who weren’t were easy.

There's a whole lot of infrastructure around flying a UAV. Communications, planning, setup, contingencies, etc.

For example, the Global Hawk runs about $28,000/hour [1] to operate, an F-18 around $10,500/hour [2].

[1] https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/why-t ... 1629932000

[2] https://fighterjetsworld.com/air/mainte ... ets/11995/

There's a lot of high end technicians servicing a Global Hawk and it's missions require substantially more planning and management. Yet the Global Hawk has one engine and the F-18 has two.

I've lived long enough and worked with enough robotic systems and programs to know that the claimed cost and manpower reductions are often not achieved.

BTW, the Global Hawk costs $220M, too.

Mike C.

Mike, you are comparing apples to oranges. Total acquisition cost of $13B to get $180M per aircraft is not the same to acquire one Super Hornet for $80M, you left out the development cost of the Super Hornet which was $4B+, plus spares, training, etc.

Nothing is straight forward in putting an autonomous a/c about a carrier. Northrop did it with their X-47 a few years back. This UAS will revolutionize Naval Aviation in my opinion.



Wikipedia says the program cost is $804M. With delivery of 72 aircraft, total program to run $13B, net $180M per aircraft. To put that in perspective, you can buy TWO F-18 Super Hornets (~$80M each) and have money left over for that unit cost.

That seems like a lot for what should be a pretty straightforward thing by modern standards.

I also worry this program will not actually deliver the practical benefits it is expected to.

Mike C.

Global Hawk vs MQ-25 are two totally different missions. The sensor system on the GH requires a lot of advanced planning for the mission to be successful and obtain the data you want. Plus the Global Hawk is about twice the size of a MQ-25 (I know because I have stood next to both of them). The MQ-25 is pretty straight forward mission set, catapult off, climb to 30Kft, cruise to mission location several hindered nautical miles away, orbit that specified point in space, give fuel, then return to carrier and land. Now they may get fancier with sensors as upgrade to MQ-25 later in its life, but today its #1 mission is to give fuel so that an F/A-18E/F can do its mission instead of being the designated tanker.



There's a whole lot of infrastructure around flying a UAV. Communications, planning, setup, contingencies, etc.

For example, the Global Hawk runs about $28,000/hour [1] to operate, an F-18 around $10,500/hour [2].

[1] https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/why-t ... 1629932000

[2] https://fighterjetsworld.com/air/mainte ... ets/11995/

There's a lot of high end technicians servicing a Global Hawk and it's missions require substantially more planning and management. Yet the Global Hawk has one engine and the F-18 has two.

I've lived long enough and worked with enough robotic systems and programs to know that the claimed cost and manpower reductions are often not achieved.

BTW, the Global Hawk costs $220M, too.

Mike C.

That why I think the man power reductions are not going to be much, if any.

The MQ-25 program won't end up saving labor is my prediction. You still have a pilot, they just aren't in the airplane.

Mike C.

There is a difference in personnel cost when you train a pilot and a drone operator.
Another pretty huge difference is the cost of losing such pilot over training or enemy lines, and the cost of sending a helo with a diver or spec ops to pick up said pilot.

Notwithstanding the obvious political and human cost.

That won't pay for the MQ-25 program. There's still lots of training to fly a drone and there are other skills that are required beyond a manned aircraft. The tanker pilot isn't a combat fighter pilot, either, so not as expensive to train.


That won't pay for the MQ-25 program. Those helos and crew are still provisioned for other reasons. Tankers don't generally go near the front line, either, they aren't combat aircraft. Have we ever had a tanker crew down in enemy territory? It doesn't happen very often.


Frankly, that won't pay for the MQ-25 program, either. Exceptionally few (maybe none?) of our airborne tankers have been shot down in service and there is a limit to what we will pay to save a human life.

An article on MQ-25 versus S-3 Viking:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/1 ... nker-drone

The task is pretty simple, fly out, deliver fuel, and come back. We already have (or had) aircraft that perform this function pretty well with predictable cost and reliability. What is the problem we are actually solving?

Is this $13B program justified or defense contractor welfare? Or, to put it another way, would the money spent elsewhere do more good for our military than a drone tanker?

To put it in perspective, the MQ-25 program will cost more than ALL of the Mars NASA missions combined so far. More than all the landers, orbiters, and rovers NASA has ever sent to Mars. This is for a flying gas station which we can already do by other means.

Mike C.

What prevents creating a KC-18 tanker or “drone” with minor revisions to the airframe and avionics and a bunch of new software for automation? Why must an all-new aircraft be developed versus building out new software and communications packages for an existing airframe with identical parts to what are in the fleet?