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Air Force plans to ground Global Hawk plane, stop production, report says

The Obama administration plans to ground the Global Hawk unmanned airplane and cease its production. The administration has decided to accept the Air Force’s recommendation to rely instead on the U-2 spy plane, in use since the 1950s, which has been modernized and has surveillance sensor packages similar to those of the Global Hawk, an official said. This undated photo released by the US Air Force shows a U-2 spy plane. The U-2 provides continuous day or night, high-altitude, all-weather, stand-off surveillance of an area in direct support of U.S. and allied ground and air forces. The U-2 is a single-seat, single-engine, high-altitude, reconnaissance aircraft. Long, wide, straight wings give the U-2 glider-like characteristics.

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The decision to ground the Global Hawk unmanned airplane is intended to save money as the Pentagon begins cutting at least $487 billion in spending over the next 10 years. The Global Hawk intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance program is managed from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base’s Aeronautical Systems Center, which administers an array of major Air Force weapons and aircraft programs. The plane has been in use for more than a decade.

File photo The decision to ground the Global Hawk unmanned airplane is intended to save money as the Pentagon begins cutting at least $487 billion in spending over the next 10 years. The Global Hawk intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance program is managed from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base’s Aeronautical Systems Center, which administers an array of major Air Force weapons and aircraft programs. The plane has been in use for more than a decade.

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This undated image provided by the US Air Force shows avionics specialists preparing a Global Hawk for a runway taxi test at Beale Air Force Base, Calif. The high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aerial reconnaissance system is designed to provide military field commanders with high resolution, near-real-time imagery of large geographic areas. The Global Hawk intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance program is managed from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base’s Aeronautical Systems Center, which administers an array of major Air Force weapons and aircraft programs. The plane has been in use for more than a decade.

AP photo/US Air Force photo - Stacey Knott This undated image provided by the US Air Force shows avionics specialists preparing a Global Hawk for a runway taxi test at Beale Air Force Base, Calif. The high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aerial reconnaissance system is designed to provide military field commanders with high resolution, near-real-time imagery of large geographic areas. The Global Hawk intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance program is managed from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base’s Aeronautical Systems Center, which administers an array of major Air Force weapons and aircraft programs. The plane has been in use for more than a decade.

By John Nolan, Staff Writer Updated 11:14 AM Wednesday, January 25, 2012

DAYTON — The Obama administration plans to ground the Global Hawk unmanned airplane and cease its production, despite the aircraft’s ability to help the U.S. more closely track China’s military strength, a defense industry analyst said Tuesday.

“It’s a really surprising decision, because it would seem to be the unmanned aircraft that’s suited to the great distances of the western Pacific,” said Loren Thompson, an analyst with the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va. “The bottom line here is that the Air Force has decided to ground the Global Hawk and cease production.”

The administration has decided to accept the Air Force’s recommendation to rely instead on the U-2 spy plane, in use since the 1950s, which has been modernized and has surveillance sensor packages similar to those of the Global Hawk, Thompson said.

The decision is intended to save money as the Pentagon begins cutting at least $487 billion in spending over the next 10 years, Thompson said. He attributed his report to a high-level source he declined to publicly identify.

The Global Hawk intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance program is managed from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base’s Aeronautical Systems Center, which administers an array of major Air Force weapons and aircraft programs. The plane has been in use for more than a decade.

About 100 people are assigned to the Global Hawk’s program management, base spokesman Daryl Mayer said. Typically, personnel managing an Air Force program that is being de-emphasized are transferred to other programs managed at the Aeronautical Systems Center, so that no jobs are lost, Mayer said.

Spokeswomen for the Air Force and the Office of Management and Budget said they could not comment until the president releases his fiscal 2013 budget on Feb. 13.

Northrop Grumman Corp., prime contractor for the Global Hawk, “has not received official notification from the U.S. Air Force of any change to the RQ-4 Global Hawk program of record,” company spokeswoman Cynthia Curiel wrote in an email response to the Dayton Daily News.

The administration’s decision applies directly to the Block 30, the most common form of the Global Hawk, Thompson said. It isn’t clear how much the Air Force would save by grounding the plane, he said. The government has already spent tens of millions of dollars on the Global Hawk.

The U-2 plane can fly at higher altitude but the Global Hawk can stay aloft longer, a key capability given President Obama’s newly announced security focus on the Asia-Pacific region where China is a rising military power, Thompson said.

Richard Aboulafia, a defense analyst with Teal Group Corp. in Fairfax, Va., said he had not heard the report about the Global Hawk, but wasn’t surprised because the merits and fates of the U-2 and Global Hawk programs have been discussed for years. The U-2 has been updated with today’s technology, he said.

“The U-2 is fully paid for. That’s a powerful draw in a bad budget environment,” Aboulafia said.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2242 or jnolan@DaytonDailyNews.com.

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