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CH-46 Sea Knight
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United Technologies subsidiary Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. in Stratford, CT recently received a $10.3 million increment as part of a $16.6 million cost-plus-fixed-fee contract for support of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA) Sandblaster program. Work will be performed in Arlington, VA and is expected to be complete by Sept. 8, 2008. This was a sole source contract initiated on Sept. 6, 2006 by the U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command in Redstone Arsenal, AL (W31P4Q-07-C-0182).

Sandblaster?!? Being under a helicopter’s rotors can certainly feel like that, which still doesn’t explain this award. What, does, is…

MV-22, landing
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DARPA’s Broad Agency Announcement, BAA06-45, posted September 6, 2006:

“Sandblaster is a high priority effort to develop and demonstrate effective affordable solutions to the problem of helicopter landing in BROWNOUT as well as other Degraded Visual Environments (DVE). Solutions are urgently needed for the brownout phenomenon, which causes deadly accidents during helicopter landing and take-off operations in arid desert terrain. Intense, blinding dust clouds stirred up by the aircraft’s main-rotor down-wash during near-ground flight can cause helicopter pilots to suddenly lose all visual cues. This creates significant flight safety risks from aircraft and ground obstacle collisions, rollover due to sloped and uneven terrain, etc. Sandblaster is focused on the rapid development and demonstration of sensor/visualization-display systems that will effectively provide an affordable, landing capability in brownout/DVE conditions where the visibility is temporarily as low as zero with zero landing-zone infrastructure and limited knowledge of the terrain comprising the landing area. Sandblaster must be affordable and self-contained, and include necessary sensors, instruments and displays to provide robust effective landing guidance to the pilot. Sandblaster must be compatible with upgrading existing military rotorcraft like the UH-60 Blackhawk. System A-Kit must be configurable to integrate with MH/UH-60 A/L/M Blackhawk Helicopters.”

Sikorsky is teamed with Honeywell and with Sierra Nevada Corp. Honeywell will design and produce a Sensor data-driven, Localized, External, Evidential Knowledge base (SLEEK) capability integrated with the company’s synthetic vision system. Sierra Nevada Corp. will provide see-through sensing technologies.

To see who else was interested in competing, check DARPA’s Proposer’s Day Workshop attendance list [PDF format].

British Lynx
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Brownout has been mentioned as an issue for the CSAR-X combat search and rescue helicopter program as well. See Jane’s Defense Weekly, October 31, 2006: “OPINION – Beating brownout is a CSAR priority”:

“Helicopter brownouts are probably the most significant of all military operational concerns when landings are required in the desert environment. Brownout-related mishaps account for a significant number of incidents resulting in severe injury, loss of life and aircraft.In September a US Air Force Research Laboratory/Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency researcher, Major Peter Doty, briefed that since 1973 there are estimated to have been 21 MH-53 and 10 HH-60G brownout mishaps as pilots lost visual reference due to blowing dust and debris”

CSAR-X was recently forced into a re-compete, and Sikorsky’s H-60 derived HH-92 Superhawk is one of the 3 competitors. CSAR-X competitor Boeing (HH-47 Chinook, winner before re-compete) also sent personnel to the DARPA Sandblaster Proposer’s Day Workshops; so did Lockheed Martin (US101), though those attendees were from the Missiles & Fire Control division.

Additional Readings

• Sikorsky (May 2/07) – Sikorsky Wins Contract to Find Eye of the Sandstorm.

• Special Operations Technology (Oct 6/06) – Sandblaster