Farnborough 17 July 2014
Work is continuing on the development of the Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS - Remotely Piloted Air System) P.1HH HammerHead DEMO aircraft by Piaggio Aero and Finmeccanica. The two companies announced the new results at the Farnborough International Airshow yesterday.
The Piaggio Aero P.1HH HammerHead is a multipurpose state-of-the-art Unmanned Aerial System designed to meet the need for a high-tech solution for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions (ISR). The P.1HH remotely piloted aircraft features automatic take-off and landing capabilities, making it able to fly up to 45,000 feet, with an outstanding endurance of 16 flight hours. Finnmeccanica takes part in the programme through Selex ES which has developed and supplied the vehicle management and control system, air data terminal and the ground control segment for the P.1HH HammerHead and is cooperating with Piaggio Aero to ensure highly effective integration.
The Remotely Piloted Air System (RPAS) P.1HH HammerHead flight campaign has validated and fine tuned its advanced control laws, including augmented modes, flight envelope protection and automatic flight, plus the automatic management of the ground run both in takeoff and landing.
Safety critical phases, such as take-off and landing when using the GCS and Datalink systems in manual flight, have been explored and brought to an unprecedented ease of operation, with the close collaboration between the two companies’ engineering and flight teams.
This year the RPAS P.1HH DEMO has extensively flight tested in Trapani-Birgi in Sicily (Italy) its ISR capabilities with an EO/IR sensor, managed autonomously by the Mission Management System based on Finmeccanica - Selex ES skyISTAR.
Such capabilities will be further tested by Piaggio Aero on the P.1HH, which will also integrate the Finmeccanica - Selex ES radar Seaspray7300E managed by an enhanced version of the skyISTAR Mission Management System.