Jay Clemens
Northrop Grumman has concluded the flight test for its new open mission systems architecture onboard a NASA Global Hawk unmanned aerial system.
The flight was intended to demonstrate the architecture’s ability to transmit a payload command and receive subsystem status response over a Ku SATCOM communications link between the Global Hawk and an operations center, Northrop said Wednesday.
Northrop conducted the flight at NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base.
During the demonstration, the company adapted an existing OMS abstraction layer onto an OMS open computing environment onboard the NASA aircraft.
The OMS architecture is also scheduled in late June for in-flight adaptation and demonstration on a manned airborne weapons system.
