Army's pilotless planes making presence felt in Alaska

Tipping the scales at 350 pounds, the Army Shadow 200 is slightly lighter than beefy Chicago Bears' offensive lineman Aaron Gibson. That's pretty small for an airplane.

• Photos

The Shadow 200 is a pilotless plane that has been used on spy missions in Iraq since arriving there a year ago. Now it's finding a home base in Alaska and other posts, as unmanned aerial vehicles play an increasingly important role in the U.S. military.

"They're one more way of scouting an area, one more tool," said Lt. Col. Richard Williams, commander of the unit in charge of the Shadows at Fort Wainwright, where the UAVs and relevant equipment will be based after they arrive in late July. Plans also call for exercises around forts Richardson and Greely.

Relatively small and light, the Shadow is easily disassembled for transport to almost anywhere on the planet. It has a 13-foot wing span - about twice that of a bald eagle - and measures only 11 feet long.

In Alaska, four Shadows will join the 172nd Stryker Brigade's arsenal of war tools. They are among nine four-plane Shadow systems headed to posts in the United States and abroad this year.

Twenty-two soldiers currently training at Fort Huachuca, Ariz., will be assigned to UAV duties within the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat team. The brigade - expected to be fully operational by May 2005 - is among the high-tech, versatile units being developed for quick deployment around the world.

Before the remote-controlled Shadows could fully function in Alaska, however, the Army had to work out some kinks after cold-weather trials showed the planes weren't ready for the state's harsh conditions, said Tim Owings, deputy program manager for the Army's ground maneuver UAVs.

Early tests at the White Sands Missile Range in southcentral New Mexico showed performance fell in extreme cold created in the test facility's environmental chamber. Original equipment, such as the oil distribution system, started to freeze up at 30 degrees below zero. Pressurized nitrogen in the Shadow's hydraulic launcher began leaking through the seals.

"That meant instituting design changes," Owings said. "The goal is to deliver a product the soldiers of Alaska can have confidence in. Their job is to use this system as it's intended to operate - to find the bad guys."

In Iraq, performance was affected by intense heat and dust, causing engine failure in some instances - problems that also led to equipment improvements. Among nine mishaps, however, crew errors also led to crashes, according to officials.

"But here's the key thing: no one died," said Robert Hunt, an Army spokesman. "It's a lot easier to lose a UAV than a manned aircraft."

That makes UAVs ideal for intelligence gathering in battle zones and beyond. Scientists have done cold-weather research on Alaska's North Slope, using drones little bigger than remote-controlled model planes. The Coast Guard will be trying out a civilian version of the Air Force's Predator B this summer for possible use in fisheries patrols. The same plane will be tested as a possible way to patrol the trans-Alaska oil pipeline.

Shadows, which cost about $530,000 apiece, are equipped with infrared cameras, global positioning units and sensors that fill in for human pilots. They can be controlled from a 75-mile range and can cruise up to four hours at altitudes as high as 14,000 feet.

Over the past year, the planes have put in more than 5,800 hours in surveillance and reconnaissance missions in Iraq. Among 14 systems currently deployed in the United States and abroad, Shadows also have been used during surveillance exercises at the Mexican border and for drug interdiction programs.

Although not among the military UAVs used to fire on enemy targets, Shadows have seen action monitoring suspicious marks such as smoke columns, tanks or vehicles believed to hold bombs or weapons. They helped troops assess battle damage and track enemy vehicles to their home base, beaming video footage and logistical coordinates to system computers and ground crews.

"Where UAVs tend to make their living is in conditions too dangerous for people to do - hostile territory and dirty environments, either nuclear or biohazard," Owings said.

The Army is eyeing other uses for the planes built by Hunt Valley, Md., contractor AAI Corp. Possible future applications include laser pointers to guide missiles to targets and synthetic aperture radar to see through clouds, dust and smoke.

Another potential mission is the job of delivering blood, vaccines and other crucial medical provisions to troops via parachute.

"That idea is still in its infancy," Owings said. "It's still several years away."

Web links

For more, go to www.shadowtuav.com