The New Dark Age

The UK’s Military Aviation Authority (MAA) has issued ‘Military Type Certification’ to the UK’s new ‘Protector’ armed drone, meaning that it is now free to fly within UK airspace, including over populated areas.

Previously, for safety reasons, Protector and other large uncrewed systems such as the Protector’s predecessor, the Reaper, were only allowed to fly in segregated airspace, with other aircraft excluded.  Although large military drones are spreading rapidly, as Drone Wars has documented they continue to tumble out of the skies for a whole variety of reasons.

The UK is the first country to certify a large drone to fly freely in unsegregated airspace and General Atomics, the manufacturer of the drone – which they call MQ-9B SkyGuardian rather than UK designation of ‘Protector RG1’– were delighted as it has huge implications for their sales.  The company’s press release called it “a seminal achievement.”  A key element of the  approval, alongside “rigorous testing”, was apparently the ‘rigid separation’ of mission software from flight critical software.

Protector flights in the UK

The Protector has been undertaking a short series of test flights around RAF Waddington, the home of UK drone warfare, over the past few weeks. The Aviationist noted two tests in the past week which were of the longest duration so far, including one which saw the drone fly to RAF Marham before taking off and returning to Waddington.  RAF Marham is the nominated diversion airfield for the drone.

General Atomics reported that 10 of the 16 Protector drones ordered had now been delivered to the UK but it is not clear if these are all at RAF Waddington  as previous drones that have ‘been delivered’ to the RAF remained in the US for testing and trials.  The UK is increasingly secretive about its drone operations and exact details about when Protector is to come into service have been given vaguely as ‘by the end of 2025’.  Reaper is also expected to exit service by the end of the year.

Protector test and training flights are now likely to expand both in number and in range, including flights to launch weapons at Holbeach Air Weapons Range, near Boston in The Wash. Protector carries the Paveway IV guided bomb and Brimstone 3 missiles.

The Ministry of Defence has always been clear that Protector will also be available to support counter-terrorism operations within the UK and undertake Military Aid to Civilian Authorities (MACA) tasks such as assisting HM Coastguard with search and rescue missions. 

The RAF also intends to open an International Training Centre at RAF Waddington to train pilots from overseas militaries to fly large armed drones. Training course in the US are often oversubscribed, creating a waiting list and the UK sees an opportunity to sell places on its training courses.  While much of this training will be ‘synthetic’ (i.e. on simulators) it is likely that some flying by these overseas pilots will also be done in the UK.

StormShroud

News of the certification of Protector to fly in the UK comes a week after PM Keir Starmer announced that the UK has brough its new ‘StormShroud’ drone into service. StormShroud is a Tekever AR3 drone equipped with BriteStorm electronic jamming capability and said by the RAF, to the first of its Autonomous Collaborative Platforms (ACP).  The idea is for the drone is to jam defence radar to enable combat aircraft to get through  and undertake an attack.

216 Squadron will operate 24 StormShroud drones which will apparently ‘be capable of conducting autonomous swarming operations, including by drawing on artificial intelligence technology.’  Some scepticism of these inflated claims is warranted.

While the concept of ACP drones – dubbed Collaborative Combat Aircraft by the US –  is for the drones to fly alongside or ahead of combat aircraft,  StormShroud drones will be deployed from the ground with the drones arrival apparently timed to coincide with the arrival of a UK combat aircraft.  How (and whether)  this will actually work in practice remains to be seen.