Carol Collins
General Atomics has rolled out the first MQ-9A Block 5 unmanned aircraft and ground control station the company’s aeronautical systems unit produced for the Netherlands’ air force to fulfill a foreign military sales requirement.
The acceptance testing phase for the Dutch remotely piloted aircraft is scheduled to commence in early 2022 at the Gray Butte Flight Operations Facility in California, the company said Wednesday.
Under the FMS deal, General Atomics will provide four MQ-9A Block 5 drones and four terminals to the customer.
“The Netherlands now joins the United Kingdom, Italy, France and Spain as NATO countries operating our advanced RPAs, with Belgium coming online in the next few years,” said Linden Blue, GA-ASI CEO.
The Block 5 system is designed to operate for more than 27 hours, fly at a speed of 240 knots and carry up to 3,850 pounds of payload.
Aircraft features include a full motion video processing system, synthetic aperture and maritime surveillance radars and a moving target indicator.
