Workforce “chaos” sees Minister can BAMS

“Introducing such an advanced new aircraft at this time would have caused incredible workforce pressures on the Australian Defence Force, particularly given the requirement to transition the Air Force’s AP-3C Orion fleet to a new manned surveillance aircraft in the same time period,” Mr Fitzgibbon said. “The Australian Government has taken swift action to alleviate these transitional issues by declining the option to continue on with further collaboration with the United States Navy’s developmental program at this time.”

Northrop Grumman officials had been stressing to the ADF that, rather than buying Global Hawks through a Foreign Military Sales (FMS) deal later next decade, Australia should get on board the BAMS System Design and Development (SDD) program as soon as possible, as the company believes an early commitment to the BAMS program would be beneficial for Australia as it would have given the ADF a seat at the table in defining the final configuration of the BAMS aircraft during development, rather than having to do an expensive and time consuming separate design review process for any Australia-specific requirements at a later date, or having to buy an off the shelf capability which may not totally suit Australia’s requirements. For Northrop Grumman, an early commitment to BAMS by an astute buyer like Australia would undoubtedly have prompted other countries also looking for a high end UAS to look harder at the Global Hawk.

But the ADF appears to have prioritised the manned element of the AP-3C replacement capability over the unmanned replacement, meaning it will likely commit to the P-8A Poseidon in its initial Spiral 0 or Spiral 1 configuration sooner rather than later, despite the fully capable Spiral 2 version of that aircraft unlikely to be available before 2020. So, in a scenario reminiscent of those undertaken in recent years by 36SQN with its C-130H Hercules as it moved over to the C-17A, and by 1SQN with its F-111Cs in favour of F/A-18F Super Hornets, either 10SQN or 11SQN will likely transfer a number of its maintenance and flying personnel and all of its AP-3C Orions over to its augmented sister squadron from 2014 so that it may commence training on and conversion to the P-8A, of which between eight and 12 are believed to be required. Once the P-8A unit is close to achieving an Initial Operational Capability (IOC) in the 2017 timeframe, the second squadron will then retire its remaining AP-3Cs and will transition to the unmanned element, with that capability achieving IOC sometime after 2020.

The BAMS RQ-4N is based on the USAF RQ-4B Block 30 airframe which incorporates optical, radar based, and signals intelligence sensor payloads. Modifications to the standard Block 30 airframe include de-icing for low to medium altitude operations and additional hail and birdstrike certification work on the aircraft’s composite wing, empennage and radome structures. Interestingly, Northrop Grumman says the USAF has shown interest in many of the attributes developed for the BAMS version of the aircraft, in particular the de-icing system. Developed from the system used on the Citation X business jet, de-icing is accomplished by sending an electro-magnetic ‘pulse’ through the wing leading edge which knocks off any ice as it forms, while the anti-icing systems on the engine intake and V-tail are more conventional bleed air heating.

Under its developmental Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) program, the US Navy plans to field five overlapping ‘orbits’ of Global Hawks from bases in Hawaii, Guam, the Indian Ocean, Italy and Florida from 2018 to provide a year-round 24 hour picture of maritime traffic in regions frequented by US Navy and merchant vessels, and to this end, has recently commenced trials over the Persian Gulf region with two Block 10 Global Hawks based in the UAE. RAAF aircraft based out of the north and northwest of Australia would be a nice fit in the US Navy’s plans, particularly over the congested shipping lanes in and around the Indonesian archipelago, the south western Pacific islands, the eastern Indian Ocean, and even up as far as into the South China Sea.

But despite deferring the Air 7000 Phase 1B decision, the ADF says it will maintain a watching brief on Global Hawk developments “and other similar unmanned aircraft programs” with a view to potentially reviving the project early next decade. Northrop Grumman, while expressing its disappointment in the Commonwealth’s decision, has committed to continuing its marketing effort and has offered “alternative acquisition arrangements” for the system. To this end, the company has also re-stated the Global Hawk’s civil defence applications, an especially relevant point in light of the recent bushfires and floods which have ravaged parts of Australia. “We remain confident of the Global Hawk UAS’s suitability for Australia as an ideal platform for demanding military and civilian surveillance requirements,” the president of Northrop Grumman International, John Brooks, said in a March statement. “We hope to talk with US and Australian government officials in the near future to agree on a solution that delivers this capability to Australia, within its resource constraints.”

One possible solution believed to have been put forward by NG is that of a lease-buy arrangement that would be supported by civilian contractors at most levels. The company had previously pushed the idea of having non-uniformed contract personnel involved in aircraft and systems maintenance, in launch and recovery operations, and in manning forward staging bases such as those in northern Australia.