September 25, 2024 | International, C4ISR, Security
October 8, 2020 | International, Aerospace, Naval, C4ISR, Security
Drones Deployed for Maritime Surveillance off France
Aiming to test the use of Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) in enhancing the maritime awareness picture in the French Mediterranean Sea, Secrétariat Général de la Mer requested the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) set up a multipurpose maritime surveillance operation, having the Navy (Marine Nationale) and customs (Douanes) as the operation's strategic and tactical leaders.
Operational missions started on September 23 for an initial period of three months. The RPAS service will consist of general maritime surveillance over waters under French sovereignty and jurisdiction in the Mediterranean Sea, encompassing maritime monitoring and surveillance in support of coast-guard functions. This includes maritime safety and security, supporting further maritime domain situational awareness, fisheries control and law enforcement. The operation will also focus on maritime environmental protection, namely oil spill detection and characterization, identification of targets possibly connected and where needed offering support to oil spill response.
Marine Nationale and Douanes will command and monitor the missions remotely from Toulon and Marseille respectively and the RPAS will be operated from the French Air Force Base (BA125) of Istres.
The contractor operating the RPAS is the consortium REACT (with partners CLS and TEKEVER) and the aircraft to be used is the AR-5 unmanned fixed wing aircraft. This asset has a payload comprising a maritime radar, electro-optical and infra-red cameras, AIS receiver and EPIRB antenna. It is ready to fly under SATCOM and can perform night and day operations.
https://www.marinelink.com/news/drones-deployed-maritime-surveillance-off-482264
On the same subject
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September 15, 2020 | International, Naval
Maintenance delays are ‘blood in the water’ for aircraft carrier critics, admiral says
David B. Larter WASHINGTON – The head of the U.S. Navy's East Coast-based aviation enterprise said the service must demand to get aircraft carriers out of their maintenance availabilities on time, and that failure to do so throws fuel on the fire of critics who say the aircraft carrier is becoming irrelevant. Calling carrier operational availability his “number one concern,” Rear Adm. John Meier, commander of Naval Air Forces Atlantic, said the service had to make sure shipyards delivered its ships to the fleet on time. “More often than not we've been having delays getting them out of the yards on time,” Meier said at the virtual edition of the annual Tailhook Association Symposium. "With the budgetary pressure we'll be facing, when we don't get the return on the enormous investment in aircraft carriers, every day we lose of operational ability is like a drop of blood in the water. “It fans the flames of critics who want to cut aircraft carriers. And in my mind, I can't see a naval aviation force or a Navy without carriers in the future.” A recent government watchdog report said that 75 percent of the Navy's carrier and submarine maintenance availabilities have run late, resulting in 7,425 days of delays. Both the Truman and Eisenhower have had recent maintenance woes and delays, and the carrier Bush is currently working through a 28-month maintenance period, much longer than the normal 16-month availability. A forthcoming DoD-led Navy force structure assessment could herald cuts to the 11-carrier fleet. In April, Defense News reported that the Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation (CAPE) office within the Office of the Secretary of Defense recommended cutting two aircraft carriers from the current force structure in the coming decades. https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2020/09/11/maintenance-delays-are-blood-in-the-water-for-aircraft-carrier-critics-admiral-says/
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June 1, 2021 | International, C4ISR, Security
After uncertainty around its future, Pentagon will continue defending the JEDI cloud
After the Pentagon said it would reassess its JEDI cloud strategy, the department now indicates that it will keep fighting for the contract in court.