6 minute read
Rockets and Rotors
By LT Thomas “Cosmo” Sandford, USN
If it weren’t for the chirps of frogs from the ponds and swampgrass surrounding the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport's Unmanned Aircraft Systems (MARS UAS) Airfield on any given evening, one could hear a pin drop on the runway.
The secluded airfield, nestled within the confines of Virginia’s NASA Wallops Flight Facility, occupies a narrow stretch of improved swampland just big enough for a runway. The silence is only occasionally punctuated with the sound of rocket launches, and more recently, the hum of unmanned drones.
While industry professionals know NASA Wallops Flight Facility as a flexible, cost-effective launch location for government and commercial earth and space-bound applications, the tenant MARS UAS Airfield within it serves a new need: providing warfighters with a superior site to hone their skills while operating unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
One of those warfighters includes Helicopter Sea Combat Squadron 22 (HSC-22), the first East-Coast-based Navy squadron to deploy operationally with the MQ-8 Fire Scout Unmanned Aerial System. In addition to operating the manned MH-60S Knighthawk helicopter, the Norfolk, Virginia-based squadron also operates two variants of the MQ-8 Fire Scout UAS, and uses MARS Airfield to gain proficiency flying drones prior to deployment.
“Flying at MARS UAS Airfield gives us a good opportunity to fly the Fire Scout live and work out the procedures we can’t train to in the simulator,” says LCDR Richard Mehlmann, HSC-22 Operations Officer and former HSC-22 Detachment 7 Officer-in-Charge.
The Fire Scout requires three Sailors to operate, including an enlisted Ground Maintenance Vehicle Operator (GMVO) who interacts physically with the Fire Scout while on the ground, a commissioned Air Vehicle Operator (AVO) who commands it to launch, land, and controls its flight path, and an enlisted Mission Payload Operator (MPO) who controls the BRITE STAR Block II MTS camera system or ZPY-4 / ZPY-8 surface-search radar.
“Flying there starts to build the crew resource management (CRM) process between the AVO, MPO, and GMVO,” Mehlmann says. “It also gives our maintenance department a feel for how to balance MH-60S maintenance with Fire Scout maintenance with a day-to-day flight schedule, and gives them the opportunity to execute flight-related maintenance on the Fire Scout, since all we’re able to do at our home base is ground turns.”
Fire Scout operations require dedicated and uncongested airspace not available at the Squadron’s home base at Chambers Field in Norfolk, Virginia, about two hours south of the MARS UAS Airfield. The vast network of restricted airspace above NASA Wallops Flight Facility provides plenty of uncrowded airspace, making it the perfect area for HSC-22 aircrews to put the Fire Scout through its paces in ways the home based simulators cannot.
“It’s the first time you can really work through the grooming process of the Mission Control Station (MCS), learn how to communicate with the GMVO, and is typically the first time you’re able to use the RADAR and the Fire Scout’s communications relay feature,” Mehlmann says. “For example, we were flying the Fire Scout over Wallops for a Combat Search and Rescue event, and we were able to relay communications via the MCS to Accomack Airfield.”
But where the Fire Scout really shines is in its ability to provide real-time intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) via its BRITE STAR Block II Multispectral Targeting System and radar, which can pipe video and radar contacts directly back into the shipboard display systems aboard the Littoral Combat Ships HSC-22 deploys in conjunction with, a feature the manned MH-60S doesn’t have, Mehlmann says. On a past training detachment to MARS UAS Airfield, the squadron flew the Fire Scout for ISR coverage concurrently with a dual-ship MH-60S direct action flight event involving about 30 opposing forces. The Fire Scout was able to get comprehensive imagery coverage of the operating area and pass contacts to the ground team and the MH-60s prior to them arriving, according to Mehlmann.
“That ISR coverage is great for overland missions,” Mehlmann says. “But when we use it over water, the Fire Scout is perfect for Surface Surveillance Coordination (SSC), and the radar payload contact information can actually be incorporated into the ship’s systems, as well.”
Being well-versed in ISR and radar operations is essential for HSC-22 aircrews when they deploy aboard Littoral Combat Ships with one MH-60S and one Fire Scout, with each detachment lasting about four months. Deployments occur in the Carribean near South America, where the squadron is tasked with conducting Counter-Illicit Trafficking (CIT) operations to disrupt the smuggling of illegal drugs.
“You can quickly launch the Fire Scout to verify suspicious radar contacts,” Mehlmann says.
Once the Fire Scout verifies a contact of interest, the DET can then launch a MH-60S helicopter with embarked Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachment personnel to interdict the vessel. The strategy works well, and although not all CIT operations have involved the Fire Scout, the squadron has conducted at least 12 successful interdictions since deploying with the Fire Scout.
But before every squadron deploys, future Fire Scout detachment Officers-in-Charge like LCDR Dicken Counts learn to take things one step at a time at MARS UAS Airfield. He plans on deploying aboard the USS Sioux City (LCS-11) in the fall with the Fire Scout.
“I’ve only flown the Fire Scout a couple times in Wallops, but from what I hear, it is a very effective asset,” Counts says. “I’m excited to launch it, send it up away from the ship, employ its radar, increase the ship’s situational awareness, see what’s out there, and then use that to our benefit.”
MARS UAS Airfield detachments also provide junior officers with the chance to get more comfortable flying the aircraft around ground crews prior to deploying, something you cannot replicate in the simulator.
“The first time I flew the actual aircraft, it was nervewracking,” says LT Brody Samaha, “because you have to trust that the aircraft is doing what it is supposed to be doing. You’re in a ground station 50 yards away from it, so if something goes wrong, it could come down on someone.”
It also provides aircrews the opportunity to work through issues that may arise in flight. For example, Samaha experienced a loss of link with the Fire Scout vehicle and was able to practice critical procedures real-time with the Air Vehicle.
“It was surprising, especially because I was the only pilot it happened to,” Samaha says. “I feel more comfortable with lost link scenarios after that. I had put in my lost link settings right before that, and the Fire Scout did exactly what it was supposed to do.”
MARS UAS Airfield is a rare training resource. When the $5.8 million state-funded facility opened in 2017, it was designed to be a national hub for UAV testing, and was one of just six FAA test sites for UAS systems.
The diminutive runway may only be 3,000 feet long by 75 feet wide, but the economic and training benefits it provides are robust. Once paired with a secure hangar and briefing facility, the presence of MARS UAS Airfield has enabled the commonwealth to capture at least $270 million in total economic impacts through 2020, according to a Virginia Space press release.
By using MARS UAS Airfield to train for future deployments, HSC-22 and its pilots, maintenance personnel, and aircrew get the training they need to be better at all things Fire Scout.
“I love being a Fire Scout AVO,” Samaha says. “It’s the reason why I chose to come to HSC-22. The Fire Scout is the future of naval aviation.”
An aerial view of MARS UAS Airfield. NASA Courtesy Photo
