DESERT HAWK SPY PLANE IS ON DUTY TINY CRAFT WEIGHS ONLY 7 POUNDS.

Byline: Jim Skeen Staff Writer

PALMDALE - A tiny spy plane developed by Lockheed Martin engineers in Palmdale is doing sentry duty around U.S. air bases in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Weighing seven pounds and looking like something out of a hobby shop, Desert Hawk controls itself without human guidance and carries video cameras and infrared sensors that allow security personnel to scout outside bases without exposing themselves to danger.

``A key factor of our system is it's fully autonomous. You don't have to have a guy standing there with a joy stick,'' said David Eichstedt, Lockheed Martin's project manager.

A product of Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. - Palmdale, the craft is formally known as the Force Protection Airborne Surveillance System, or FPASS. It was nicknamed Desert Hawk by the general in charge of air forces in the Middle East.

The Desert Hawk is just 32 inches long and has a wingspan of 52 inches, powered by an electric motor and able to fly for an hour to 75 minutes at a time.

It is operated in a system that each includes six Desert Hawks, a ground station and a remote viewing terminal, plus a field kit for repairs.

While the Desert Hawk looks like a remote-controlled model plane, it is much more sophisticated.

Its missions are programmed in advance using a touch-screen interface on a laptop computer. A mission can be changed while the aircraft is in flight.

The aircraft lands by itself, without guidance from its human operators.

Rather than taking off from a runway, the aircraft are launched into the air with a bungee cord that can stretch out to 150 feet.

``It can fling it up 200 feet in short order,'' Eichstedt said.

The Defense Department is looking at expanding the use of Desert Hawk by placing unmanned air vehicles and their operators with Army Special Operations forces. Four systems have been delivered to the British Army.

For now, Lockheed Martin is focused on military uses of the Desert Hawk. Federal Aviation Administration regulations block unmanned air vehicles from using the national air space, making civilian applications problematic.

NASA and the aviation industry are embarking on an effort to determine what regulations and what advancements in unmanned air vehicle technologies are needed to allow aircraft like Desert Hawk as well as larger unmanned craft to routinely use the national air space.

Resolving those issues will open up the national air space for civilian applications of UAVs.

``You can think of all kinds of cool things to do with UAVs - look for forest fires, search and rescue missions, monitoring aqueducts and pipelines,'' Eichstedt said.

The Desert Hawk's roots go back to 1996 when Lockheed Martin was conducting research and development under a program called Micro Air Vehicle for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. At the time, DARPA was interested in the idea of developing a UAV that was no more than 6 inches long.

Out of that work came development of autopilot and communications technologies that would serve as the backbone of Desert Hawk.

In February 2002, as the Afghanistan campaign was well under way, Lockheed Martin entered into a contract with the Air Force to begin providing the Desert Hawk systems. The first two systems were delivered four months later.

The Air Force was so pleased with the system that it nominated Desert Hawk for the 2002 Collier Trophy, the aviation world's equivalent of an Academy Award. While it did not win the Collier, the Air Force's nomination was high praise.

Employment numbers on the program were not disclosed, but company spokeswoman Dianne Knippel said the Desert Hawk is not a large employment project.

The Desert Hawk is in use in both Iraq and Afghanistan, but Lockheed Martin officials would not comment on how many have been deployed.

Jim Skeen, [phone]

james.skeen(at)dailynews.com

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2 photos

Photo:

(1 -- 2 -- color) Senior Airman David Tillery, left, and Tech. Sgt. Lloyd Joyner look over a seven-pound Desert Hawk after a test mission. At right,Tillery launches Desert Hawk by use of a bungee cord. The unmanned vehicle allows forces to see beyond a base's perimeters for threats.

Staff Sgt. A.C. Eggman/U.S. Air Force