U.S. plans to deploy an unmanned surveillance airship to Afghanistan are moving forward, with a contract for the Long Endurance Multi-Intelligence Vehicle (LEMV) demonstration expected to be awarded by year-end.
Designed to stay aloft for three weeks carrying a heavy payload of wide-area sensors, the airship is becoming a flagship for Defense Dept. efforts to provide unblinking airborne surveillance to defeat the threat from roadside bombs.
The LEMV is required to stay aloft at 20,000 ft. for 21 days carrying a 2,500-lb. payload, a combination of either a multi-camera wide-area airborne surveillance (WAAS) sensor or a ground moving-target indication (GMTI) radar plus a signals-intelligence system and multiple electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) sensors.
Lockheed Martin’s design is a 250-ft.-long hybrid airship, which derives 80% of its lift from helium buoyancy and the rest from aerodynamics so it can be launched and recovered without the traditional airship ground infrastructure. The vehicle will be optionally piloted: manned for self-deployment and unmanned for surveillance missions.
Here’s the Lockheed Martin prototype, the real thing will be twice as large.
