The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's $506 million Integrated Sensor Is Structure program is developing a persistent stratospheric airship with an active-array radar built into the envelope to perform air and ground surveillance and tracking.
A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report cites technical challenges and rapid acquisitions of some lighter-than-air Earth 0bservation platforms as problematic.
At the height of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, airships looked to be the answer to demands for persistent, “staring-eye” surveillance. But problems developing the systems”including, surprisingly, the decades-old technology of building a lighter-than-air vehicle”means they are coming along just as the window of opportunity is closing.
The GAO tells a heavy tale of lighter-than-air development and procurement troubles in a new report on Pentagon aerostat and airship programs.
Concept image courtesy of Lockheed Martin.
Read the highlights of the GAO report.
Read the full 48-page GAO report: Defense Acquisitions”Future Aerostat and Airship Investment Decisions Drive Oversight and Coordination Needs.
