and actually x things before it gets into the
aircraft. By the time you are ying, many
times it’s too late in a sense because you
are now ight testing software in the actual
aircraft and if you’re discovering major
glitches at this point in programme, then
you have got real problems. You may have
to take major steps backwards to try to x
them and if the problems are large enough
things can slip massively not only timewise,
but in budget as well. By having the VX-30
test pilots in the labs and working with the
software development teams you can work
out a lot of the bugs on the ground before
you have to do an actual ight and with the
complexities of these software packages this
is very important and cost effective and the
new way of doing test and we are a big part
of that.”UNMANNED TESTING
The Bloodhounds are also the primary
operators of Group III and above UAS in
the Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons
Division and also the only test squadron
for the Navy’s next generation unmanned
helicopter, the MQ-8C Fire Scout. Its airframe
is manufactured by Northrop Grumman
and based on the commercial Bell 407
helicopter. The VX-30 Unmanned System
Test (UST) team has a mix of enlisted sailors,
officers, government civilians and contract
support personnel. The goal is to safely and
effectively test and integrate new and existing
UAS aircraft into Navy service. The UAS
department is the most rapidly expanding
within VX-30 and will continue to grow for
the foreseeable future. The squadron has
been paving the path for operations and testwith the MQ-8C as well as the NRQ-21A
Blackjack, the primary US Marine Corps
UAS platform of the future. The UST team
has developed a comprehensive Concept of
Operations (CONOPS) for unmanned aircraft
systems which is being used as the model
within the vast Naval Air Systems acquisition
community.
The Bloodhounds have achieved many
rsts in unmanned systems such as ying a
UAS in national airspace on the West Coast
under a FAA Certi cate of Authorization
(COA), the rst unmanned system approved
to operate concurrently with manned aviation
traffic in tower airspace and the rst military
operators of the MQ-8C.
The Fire Scout completed its
developmental ight test programme in 2015
and has an ongoing operational assessment26 Aviation News incorporating Classic Aircraft May 2016This S-3B received a ‘Battle of Midway’ paint scheme in 2011 to mark 100 years of US naval aviation.The last two S-3Bs in the US Navy do one nal break over the Channel Islands
on the week they both left Point Mugu, one for storage and the other to NASA.20-27_vx30DC.mf.indd 26 06/04/2016 17:01