Northrop Grumman has partnered with VX Aerospace on a proposal to equip the U.S. Navy‘s updated E/A-18G Growler aircraft with a canister-launched unmanned air vehicle platform, Flightglobal reported Thursday.
JJ Thompson, naval aviation campaign director at Northrop’s mission systems business, told Flightglobal the service branch has expressed interest in adopting the Dash X UAV for a potential manned-unmanned teaming effort with the Growler’s Block II model.
Dash X, designed to gather and transmit electronic warfare information, completed a flight test in October that was funded by the Office of Naval Research.
The 12-foot-long folding UAV is equipped with a small combustion engine and built to fly at a speed of 60 knots, the report noted.