Lockheed Conducted Deck Handling Demo for its MQ-25 Entry

Lockheed has stated it conducted a demonstration of deck handling for its MQ-25A entry. This is the competition to build a UAV tanker for the Navy's carriers. It is a little unclear whether or not the demo was of the flying wing design (which is implied in the article) or done with a surrogate aircraft.

The approach Lockheed seems to be taking appears to be different than what General Atomics and (possibly) Boeing are doing. They both have the deck handlers directly control the aircraft. Lockheed seems to have someone remotely controlling the uav: there are a lot of cameras in the nose of the aircraft so whomever is controlling the UAV can follow the directions of the deck handlers. The approach is interesting, but I would think that would make the carrier have a dedicated control room for the UAVs. While that may be necessary for all the candidates, it is something that I have only seen explicitly stated by Lockheed and absolutely necessary with their approach.

If Lockheed HAS built their Sea Ghost, I am a bit surprised they haven't released pictures. This is, at this point, in many ways a marketing campaign, after all.

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