Regina Garcia
An industry team led by Sierra Nevada Corp. has received a contract to deploy an uncrewed balloon for the assessment phase of the British defense ministry’s stratospheric communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance project.
SNC said Wednesday its team members for the Project Aether demonstration are the company’s mission systems subsidiary in the U.K., World View Enterprises and Digital Receiver Technology.
Efforts to integrate SNC’s proposed high-altitude balloon platform and payload will take place at a facility in Fayetteville, North Carolina, before the initial flight later this year.
The ministry unveiled the estimated $121 million project in December 2021 to address its requirement for an unmanned air system capable of performing continuous and mobile wide area communications and ISR for long-duration missions with minimal maintenance support.
