Unmanned aircraft are the common thread in the way militaries could fight future conflicts. Military leaders are already factoring technology for fully autonomous and remotely piloted aircraft into battle plans. While this weapon of the week is not a part of those plans yet, it soon could be.
The Bell V-247 Vigilant is the unmanned version of the Bell V-280 Valor. It is a long-range assault and utility tilt-rotor aircraft. The U.S. Army recently selected the Valor to replace Black Hawk helicopters.
“The Vigilant is a tilt-rotor that’s designed from the ground up to take all of the human stuff out and give you as much range as you can out of a system,” Bell Director of Government Relations Rob Freeland said. “What really helps is when you can launch from an unknown areas and affect a large part of the battlespace from that unknown spot. It keeps the enemy thinking.”
Officials from Bell said the Vigilant’s versatility and mobile footprint make it a strong candidate for several missions moving forward.
“If you design something that has a lot of vertical lift capability and you can fold it up up and stuff it into the hanger on a destroyer, you don’t have to remote pilot it,” Freeland said. “It’s rules based autonomous.”
Freeland said the aircraft can help with tasks like surveillance and reconnaissance, precision strikes, aerial escorts and delivering supplies for troops.
The Vigilant can travel more than 300 knots per hour and can carry up to 9,000 pounds of equipment at more than 25,000 feet in the air.
Several branches of the U.S. military have shown interest in unmanned aircraft like the Vigilant for their versatile capabilities.
“The Navy is very interested in something that can take off vertically from a destroyer and get out to really long ranges that are relevant to them and their warfight,” Freeland said. “The Marine Corps is really interesting in using this. And once you get the basic aircraft in place, there’s all kinds of stuff you can do with it. You can even do logistics work with. So the idea is a multi-mission aircraft, and we’ve come a long way in that in that design.”
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