The UK Military Aviation Authority (MAA) has issued a military type certificate for the Royal Air Force’s (RAF’s) General Atomics Aeronautical Systems (GA-ASI) Protector RG1, as the service continues to grow its fleet of the remotely piloted air system.
Being acquired to replace the UK’s MQ-9A-standard Reaper system, the new MQ-9B model “has passed a rigorous airworthiness assessment verifying it is safe to operate without geographic restrictions, including over populous areas”, the US airframer says.
Ten of an eventual 16 Protector air vehicles have been delivered to date, with the type based at RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire, eastern England.
GA-ASI chief executive Linden Blue describes the certification milestone, which was cleared on 29 April and disclosed on 8 May, as “a herculean effort and a seminal achievement for our company”.
“We invested over $500 million as part of an 11-year effort to develop an unmanned aircraft that meets NATO’s rigorous airworthiness standards,” he says, referring to the alliance’s STANAG 4671 Edition 2 requirements.
Key features supporting the military certification include “lightning protection, fire protection, anti-icing systems and a fatigue-and-damage-tolerant building block design approach”, GA-ASI says.
The company’s test campaign involved the use of three flight assets, plus a static test airframe which was subjected to “ground and flight loads, bird strike, hail protection and full-scale fatigue testing” totalling the equivalent of 120,000 flight hours: three times the airframe’s expected operational life.
Additionally, it notes that “mission software is rigidly separated from flight critical software”, which will “enhance its reliability and operational flexibility”.
GA-ASI cites additional orders for its MQ-9B SkyGuardian/SeaGuardian models as having been placed by Belgium, Canada, India, Japan, Poland, Taiwan and the US Special Operations Command.
“Our customers need this type certification, which will open civil airspace for their flight operations,” says Blue.
