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Sikorsky’s optionally piloted UH-60A Black Hawk has demonstrated completely uninhabited resupply capability.
Sikorsky has been awarded a $6 million DARPA contract to install its Matrix autonomy system in a U.S. Army UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter used as a fly-by-wire testbed.
The upgrade will enable the Army to evaluate autonomy capabilities for the UH-60 and potentially its planned replacement, the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft.
The Army originally planned to install the Matrix on the testbed UH-60M in 2020, when Sikorsky equipped the experimental helicopter with its fly-by-wire system, but decided instead to focus on evaluating handling qualities with the digital flight control system.
Matrix is an autonomy management system that can take high-level commands from an operator in the aircraft, or on the ground using a tablet, and automatically develop and autonomously execute a mission plan, adapting to obstacles and threats by replanning the flight to still meet the mission objective.
In an extension to DARPA’s long-running ALIAS autonomy program, the latest contract will see Sikorsky finally install the Matrix system on the modified UH-60M, which will be redesignated the MX. The upgraded aircraft will be used by Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (Devcom) to evaluate autonomy capabilities from single-pilot operation to fully uninhabited flight.
Matrix enables the UH-60 to be flown with two pilots or just one, the autonomy system acting as an intelligent digital copilot, or with no crew onboard. Sikorsky has demonstrated completely uninhabited resupply capability, a modified Black Hawk carrying internal cargo and external slung loads.
The Army has awarded Bell a contract to develop the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) but expects to continue operating the Black Hawk into the 2070s. “Modernizing the aircraft today will pay dividends for decades across Army Aviation’s current and future aircraft,” Rich Benton, vice president and general manager of Lockheed Martin company Sikorsky, said in a statement.
“I think a lot of the stuff that we are doing here on the Black Hawk is reducing risk for FLRAA,” Jay Macklin, Sikorsky director for Army and Air Force strategy and business development, said on Oct. 14. “It’s also a big advantage that, when the Army is using a fleet of 2,135 Black Hawks, when you start putting things on certain aircraft what you’re doing is informing that requirement for FLRAA.”
The company will integrate the Matrix system into the UH-60M in 2025. The resulting MX will be a near-exact copy of Sikorsky’s company-owned UH-60A Optionally Piloted Black Hawk. Along with its S-76-based Sikorsky Autonomous Research Aircraft, the modified UH-60A has completed hundreds of flight hours of autonomy testing under DARPA’s ALIAS program.
Sikorsky says the MX will enable Devcom to explore practical applications and mature a potential concept of operations for a scalable autonomy system. This will include evaluation of different sensor suites to perceive and avoid threats, obstacles and terrain.
–With Steve Trimble in Washington
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