Jane Edwards
Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works arm has teamed up with the U.S. Air Force and the Missile Defense Agency to demonstrate multidomain operations and secure data transmission across multiple systems.
The Project Riot demonstration involved a multidomain ground station, an F-35 fighter aircraft and a U-2 reconnaissance aircraft, Lockheed said Monday.
During the demonstration, the ground-based air defense commander was able to decide and target a long-range missile threat immediately using sensor data transmitted by the F-35 through the U-2 aircraft.
“This demonstration continues our commitment to provide complete battlespace awareness and seamless interoperability to enable multi-domain operations,” said John Clark, vice president of ISR and UAS at Lockheed’s Skunk Works.
Greg Ulmer, vice president and general manager for Lockheed’s F-35 program, said the demo seeks to unlock the potential of the fighter jet, which demonstrated its capability to share critical data, for multidomain operations.
Lockheed, MDA and the Air Force achieved four data points during the demo, including the ability to use the fighter jet’s sensor data for missile defense and U2’s open architecture, payload capacity and modular design to offer beyond-line-of-sight communications between the ground station and the F-35.
