DARPA has launched a program to develop swarms of little unmanned aircraft systems.
The Gremlin project is named after “the imaginary, mischievous imps that became the good luck charms of many British pilots during World War II,” said a DARPA news release. The announcement made no mention of the classic 1984 movie “Gremlins,” where hordes of little monsters wreaked havoc on a town.
DARPA’s Gremlins will be air-launched and air-recoverable. “The program envisions launching groups of gremlins from large aircraft such as bombers or transport aircraft, as well as from fighters and other small, fixed-wing platforms while those planes are out of range of adversary defenses,” said DARPA. “When the gremlins complete their mission, a C-130 transport aircraft would retrieve them in the air and carry them home, where ground crews would prepare them for their next use within 24 hours.”
Each Gremlin would be good for about 20 missions. Interestingly, the program seems designed to create UAS for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissanceISR missions rather than strike missions. “Our goal is to conduct a compelling proof-of-concept flight demonstration that could employ intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and other modular, non–kinetic payloads in a robust, responsive and affordable manner,” said DARPA program manager Dan Patt.
