BERLIN \u2014 The German military intends to revive its controversial Euro Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle program after it was canceled in 2013 due to spiraling costs and airworthiness issues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sources at the German Defense Ministry of Defense <\/span>confirmed that the drone, developed by Northrop Grumman, would be “taken out of the garage” in order to finish testing its integrated signal intelligence system (ISIS) <\/span>from Airbus Defence & Space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In October, German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen announced her intention to get the Euro Hawk drone in the air for test flights again in a move to recoup some of the \u20ac600 million (US $750 million) already invested in the project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The German Air Force is keen to fill the gap left in its signals intelligence (SIGINT)<\/span> capability since the retirement of a fleet of five Breguet Br 1150 Atlantique aircraft in 2010.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We need this technology in order to generate a clear intelligence picture on which to base our decisions, and this is a specific area of intel that we currently don’t have,” said Lt.ieutenant<\/span> Col.onel<\/span> Gero von Fritsche, Defense Ministry spokesman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He said that there are no plans to complete development on a Euro Hawk series. Instead, the military is eyeing options to put the drone’s SIGINT payload on an alternative platform. One of the most likely options for this <\/span>is the Triton MQ-4C drone, which, like the Euro Hawk, is based on the initial Global Hawk design. The Triton has also <\/span>been developed by Northrop for the US Navy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, von Fritsche confirmed that manned aircraft, platforms, <\/span>such as Airbus’ ACJ319 or Bombardier’s Global Express XRS or Global 5000 business jets, are also being considered. No decision has been made yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “There’s no point in looking only at unmanned systems if we run into the problem of not being able to certify and fly the system,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A spokeswoman for the joint venture, EH GmbH, released a statement saying it is “proud” to be working with its German partners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The German Federal Ministry of Defense awarded EH GmbH a contract modification to restart maintenance and testing on the Euro Hawk Full Scale Demonstrator on January 15, 2015,” the statement said. “The award authorizes the de-preservation and maintenance assessment of the Full Scale Demonstrator aircraft in Manching, Germany. We are proud to work with our German partners and believe that a high-altitude long-endurance aircraft is the only platform able to fulfill Germany’s SIGINT requirements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Former German Defense Minister Thomas De Maiziere canceled the Euro Hawk program in May 2013 when it became apparent the plane would not get flight clearance over Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This was due in part to NATO Stanag 4671, which requires lightning and icing protection on all aircraft flying over Europe. The original RQ-4 that was going to make up the program doesn’t have those protections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition, the Euro Hawk lacked an on board “sense and avoid system” to avoid collisions, a prerequisite to obtain flight permission in the EU.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Aaron Mehta in Washington contributed to this report.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The German military intends to revive its controversial Euro Hawk unmanned aerial vehicle program after it was canceled in 2013 due to spiraling costs and airworthiness issues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":72679,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_acf":"","_yoast_wpseo_primary_category":7,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_smg_distribution_targets":[]},"categories":[7,33],"tags":[],"coauthors":[2092],"class_list":["post-33240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-air","category-home"],"acf":{"subheadline":"","legacy_arc_id":"PKKQGVQOI5DJHFJQYFA6FZIYVQ","arc_canonical_url":"\/air\/2015\/01\/16\/germany-seeks-to-revive-euro-hawk-program\/","remove_feature_photo":false,"is_sponsored":false,"subtype":"","redirect_url":"","disable_inline_ads":false,"native_logo_pretext":"Presented By:"},"yoast_head":"\n