Watchkeeper UAV - Your Tax payments at work

[Two's in]

However you slice this, it looks like the MoD are determined not to learn anything about procurement in some areas. Even given the Guardian's passion for squaddie-bashing and leftist dogma, this is a miserable performance when compared to some viable COTS alternatives.

UK's £1.2bn bill for drone that's seen 146 hours of active duty | World news | The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/02/watchkeeper-drone-uk-military-delay-over-budget-investigation)

[NutLoose]

But you could say that about anything, write a report based on the F35 you could say the UK has spent billions on an aircraft that has seen no active service in the UK...
How long was the Tornado in development? you could have written six days in, that over a decade of development it to had only six days active service.. but it's still going strong and proved itself.
It's ok to buy off the shelf spam junk, but once the UK development and manufacturing capabilities are gone because of that, you will be forced to buy off them forever more. Unfortunately roles do change, but 15 years ago could you forsee the roles we need now? I couldn't.

[Two's in]

So are you suggesting that burning through over a Billion Pounds of critical Defence budget for zero or limited return is OK as long as we keep some UK jobs in play? To list the litany of piss-poor Procurements over the decades does not exactly justify it. If the price of a UK defence industry is wanton and profligate waste while jeopardizing military capability and lives then maybe being beholden to a foreign COTS provider does make sense? What the MoD are doing now is the absolute definition of insanity.

[barnstormer1968]

I did write a very long initial reply, but sometimes a shorter answer is better.
Are we supposed to be surprised that an aircraft for use by the Royal artillery hasn't been used in a campaign with no use of massed packs of 105s or MLRS.

It has of course been flying over the UK training for its intended purpose.
I wonder how many 'operational' hours the Royal Navy subs put in during the Afghan nastiness. They cost a lot too.

[NutLoose]

That's what I was trying to get across barnstormer.
The Tornado, Jaguar, Harrier etc etc etc spent most of their life training for war, and only in the last decades that they were called on to do it in anger, the Vulcan only managed it at the end of it's life, would you have not spent the money to develop that, as it only went to war once and for a limited time, and the Valiant and Phantom I think never did.

[ShotOne]

Presumably the Guardian wants us to have lots more wars to increase the "six day" operations figure

[barnstormer1968]

Vin Rouge.
The fact the watch keeper is roughly the same as the Hermes is another point altogether to its cost. Some of the additional capabilities are very necessary for UK/Western Europe ops, but there is one major flaw in your post IMHO.
Watch keeper is an army asset while predator is an RAF asset. The watch keeper is flown by soldiers will basic instruction while the predator is flown by a pilot/aircrew. As the Royal artillery will only gave soldiers and not pilots to fly the watch keeper mission then NO a predator wouldn't be much help :)

[Haraka]

I had the dubious pleasure some years ago of attending a "Watchkeeper" presentation by a civil servant at a UAV conference that I was also presenting at in London. Having previously worked on Phoenix systems , I was naturally distrustful of what might emerge.
Listening to all the project management timetable mumbo jumbo speak about "main gate " etc.etc. and noting that the speaker had no idea whatsoever about what the operational profile of the beast implied, I was doubtful as to when such a system might be usefully employed.

My comment: "Why not just buy from the Israelis? " of course fell on stony ground.

[ShotOne]

Why stop there Haraka? By the same logic we ought to buy our fighters from Russia, and all our warships from Korea

[Two's in]

...an aircraft for use by the Royal artillery hasn't been used in a campaign with no use of massed packs of 105s or MLRS.


Watchkeeper is not an Airborne Observation Post (AOP) for the Royal Artillery (RA). It is intended to be ISTAR platform for use at Battle Group level and above. The main reason the RA are the custodians of the capability is they have over 50 years experience of operating battlefield (dumb) drones. Helmand might not have required heavy Artillery, but it certainly needed as many ISTAR assets as were available, and Watchkeeper never even made it to the subs bench because it was late.


The discussion isn't really about debunking the Guardian's assertion that Watchkeeper hasn't been flying operationally, it's about asking why we are always prepared to accept late, under performing, and over budget equipment despite 25 years of promising "Smart Procurement".

[VX275]

I see this thing fly almost daily (or should that be hear this thing due to its high reving two stroke power unit) from Bosconbe and I'm impressed as they fly on some days when the weather is so bad the birds are walking.

[smujsmith]

No wish to cast nasturtiums on any of the foregoing gentlemen. As someone who is now convinced that the political alliance, best described as LibLabCon, are intent on denuding our military assets to a point where the offer of a combined EU army is the best way to defend our country (if Merkel approves) ! Good aircraft have been thrown away, with the current administration lauding the drone. Under that auspices they reduce manning levels, cut back on manned assets and generally under resource the existing capability. As soon as the drone has been exposed for its fallibility, the politicians will be announcing major investment in "real" aviation assets, of course, just as costs once again spiral upwards. Cynical ? Bloody right I am. No doubt the drone has its place in modern warfare, it seems that conventional forces are to pay the price. I have a neighbour who still has a control line plastic Stuka, and he does a really good display with it, perhaps that's the future for military air assets.

Smudge

[Mechta]

The big difference between Watchkeeper and Hermes 450 is the Synthetic aperture radar which makes Watchkeeper useful in typical British weather.

The sad part about the whole Watchkeeper story is the engine. RAE Farnborough put up the initial investment for Norton to develop a Wankel engine for UAV use, to give a practical alternative to the two stroke engines then in use. The vibration of these two stroke engines made adding an alternator very difficult, and this was an essential requirement.

Anyway, once the British Taxpayer had put up the money, and the spin-off company had developed a range of engines suitable for both targets and UAVs, the Israelis bought it, so the proceeds now go abroad.

[Ivan Rogov]

So 10 years to convert a perfectly suitable UAV (450) in to a more expensive UAV which is looking a bit dated and expensive compared to the competition.
ISTR about 10 years ago attending a brief where it was stressed that the most important feature was that it would be airworthy, and therefore able to fly over the UK. This immediately showed a complete lack of understanding of how to plan the future operation or appreciation of what UAVs could offer. All that time, effort and money wasted just to be able to train with it over the SPTA. A manned light aircraft with EO/IR, etc. would have made much more sense for the UK training, Norway had already been operating a light aircraft (MFI-17?) with EO/IR as a UAV evaluator for a few years.
Not convinced by the sensor configuration either, who ever devised it seems to have ignored a few major issues like being in 2 places at once and on board power from a small engine :D
Not forgetting the huge effort to deploy it to AFG and prove it was not late and really good, which must have diverted a good chunk of support away from where it was really needed :=

[Bigbux]

And yet again, the analysis goes as far as "defence procurement".

If only we could identify which pieces of defence procurement are at fault. Some of them might not look like defence procurement at all.

In the few sketchy details that the Guardian provides we see some key facts:

- Inter-service rivalry -so lack of concentration of resources
- poor Service planning - only 6 trained pilots - hence the 146 hrs rather than thousands - hence the large bill attributed to each drone.
- unforeseen problems with software and certification


No pilots? great planning.
I have no idea how well or poorly the design/development spec was drafted: but for God's sake - these things don't exist in a vacuum. If you don't plan the whole thing from cradle to grave, including the operation of them and all that entails - then you have the efficiency of a coup-led banana republic.

Unforeseen problems. No software project ever delivers to full spec or on time. There are reasons for tis which I won't go into - but they are mostly avoidable.

Certification. Really? so in the risk development meetings (if any were run) at what stage were the risks squashed by the senior stakeholder? After identification?, during the meeting? or prior to it by disapproving strongly of any dissenters? Mate of mine was posted after the ritual trashing of his OJAR because he had the temerity to point out that the emperor's tiny cock was on full view.

But try telling a Colonel or above he isn't qualified to sign-off a commercial or development programme and see how far you get.

Just more evidence to remove commercial decision making from the military.

[barnstormer1968]

Two's in
I've been trying to keep posts short. You may well see watch keeper as an overall battlefield asset, but you know the RA are the keepers and with only a small amount of RA in Afghanistan would you really expect 'their new baby' to be in theatre helping others?
I'm sure I'm coming across as a complete cynic but cap badge politics hamper the army as much as any enemy sometimes IMHO.
What I don't know is whether the RA actually want watchkeeper in the first place.

[Lima Juliet]

The RA defiantely wanted a replacement for PID for their GMLRS and AS90s - prior to the H450 and Watchkeeper they had BAeS Phoenix (nicknamed the 'f*** off' because that is exactly what it did!).

However, times have moved on and with the advent of Predator/Reaper then Watchkeeper seems 'old hat'. There was a move to arm it a while back but I think that has fallen away. Then there is the disaster of being able to operate it from a field with arrestor gear that also hasn't come to fruition. So in short the Army have paid a fortune for something that operates from a forward airfield, only has line-of-sight technology, has inferior sensors to the rest, limited endurance, high noise signature and is running late.

Should have stuck with the H450 or looked at something like Gray Eagle (US Army version of Predator). But hey, that's the old 20/20 hindsight.

LJ

[Cows getting bigger]

This whole issue goes back a decade or so, notably the disjointed way MoD embraced UAVs. I recollect that DAS got himself a UAV SO1 desk officer who spent a deal of time trying to figure who had their fingers in the various pies across the three services. The resultant wiring diagram was a a bowl of spaghetti, it being obvious that the three services were going-it alone.

Slightly smugly, it is good to see that Reaper is delivering; the RAF do Air Power. :)

[Two's in]

...but cap badge politics hamper the army as much as any enemy sometimes IMHO.

Barnstormer, I think we are in violent agreement here, I'm just highlighting that at the MoD Procurement level you would imagine cap badge politics and user dick measuring was kept in context. It clearly isn't, and as a result the Army's equipment and capability procurement are poorly managed.

[Think Defence]

Think some of you might be being a little harsh on Watchkeeper

The Royal Artillery have been operating unmanned aerial vehicles since 1964. After Midge and its successor programme, MRUASTAS, Phoenix came into service in 1998 and despite having a high loss rate, in 2003 was credited by General Brimms (GOC 1(UK) Armoured Division) as being the top 3 war winning assets in the initial stages of the Iraq war, along with Challenger and Warrior.

It played a significant part in the counter battery role that allowed UK ground forces to avoid being engaged heavily by Iraqi artillery. OK, so loss rates were high but it was never designed for the weather and in some ways, was pretty innovative, its integration with Royal Artillery fire control software and separating the payload from the air vehicle for example.

Watchkeeper developed from this, lessons learned in real operations so you could argue that as the F35 has evolved from Harrier, Watchkeeper has evolved from Phoenix.

It was initially evolved from SENDER and SPECTATOR and was meant to have two air vehicles. Unlike Reaper (then), Watchkeeper was always a core programme and so things like operation in UK airspace, low temperatures, poor weather, EO/SAR/GMTI, automatic take off and landing, rough feld performance, secure UK datalinks, expeditionary deployment systems, training facilities and full logistics support is included.

The figure includes 54 air vehicles and 13 ground systems as well.

As a stopgap, Hermes 450 was deployed to Afghanistan where it collected the majority of airborne imagery used by UK ground forces and clocked over 60,000 hours.

The deployment for a small number of flying hours by Watchkeeper last year was to prove the systems and concepts.

I know the RA has had a few issues and it might be easy to be cynical but they have more experience of unmanned systems than most and have dragged a system into service that is operable in all theatres and fully supported.

I think you also miss the point that it is a tactial system for use at Brigade level , not a theatre wide asset that may be retasked

[Ivan Rogov]

So while we developed the WK450 the French came up with this
Defence Minister Launches the French Army?s Future Tactical UAV (http://www.defense-aerospace.com/article-view/release/172780/france-signs-patroller-uav-contract.html)
Looks like they took a very different path to meet a similar requirement, with a bit more flexibility for a similar price.

Did they do a better job?

If so what can we try to apply to future procurement programs?

[ACW342]

Its an SLMG!!

1. Request a two seater for the air cadets!
2. Fit ans air data computer/electronic vario and when the bad guys hit the engine use the camera on the fin to look for thermals/ridges/wave and soar back to base.

Simples

[ricardian]

£1m military drone crashed in Wales after crew disabled anti-crash systems – report (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/08/12/watchkeeper_drone_wk031_crash_report_1m_uav_destroyed/)

There are some interesting comments on this item

[Lala Steady]

Interesting bit of blame-shifting - the rumour is that it happened at Boscombe, not Aberporth, when the crew said it was too foggy to fly but were ordered to get it airborne by a senior operator (with no UAV flying experience). The Master Override was used to try and land it and it crashed.

It is possible this was another accident entirely but the similarities are rather worrying.

[Chris Kebab]

LaLa - For all the MAA's failing I cannot help but think that "tweaking" an SI as you suggest is a tad improbable even for them!

Having read this article its difficult to conclude that activating the Master Over-ride was, in the circumstances, the least bad option. I certainly hope the "operator" wasn't censured for it and that Thales/Elbit are looking at that aspect of the design.

[212man]

Interesting bit of blame-shifting - the rumour is that it happened at Boscombe, not Aberporth, when the crew said it was too foggy to fly but were ordered to get it airborne by a senior operator (with no UAV flying experience). The Master Override was used to try and land it and it crashed.

It is possible this was another accident entirely but the similarities are rather worrying.

If you read the convening authority's comments at the end of the SI, you will see that he refers to the BD accident and that an SI will be published later this year. He remarks that there will likely be many similarities in the causal factors.

[VX275]

"Any landing you can walk away from.........." Every time if it's a UAS

[Engines]

With all due respect, I think I have to gently disagree with the idea that:

"Any landing you can walk away from.........." Every time if it's a UAS

These systems are justified as the cheaper, better alternative to manned aircraft. They won't be cheaper if they keep piling in at this sort of rate. Nor will they be better if they're not available because they've piled in.

I've looked at the loss rates for UAVs (UAS, RPAS, drone, etc) and they don't look all that clever. I just hope that when we buy this sort of kit in the future we factor in a realistic attrition rate. Even more important as they get less cheap.

Best regards as ever to those working the cost models,

Engines

[VX275]

I was quite relieved to be able to walk out of the cabin after the UAV I was pilot for lost eight foot of wing at 49 000 ft.

[Lala Steady]

If you read the convening authority's comments at the end of the SI, you will see that he refers to the BD accident and that an SI will be published later this year. He remarks that there will likely be many similarities in the causal factors. Found that now, thanks 212man:ok: I knew about the BD crash but hadn't realised they had speared one in earlier.

Why would you have a UAV that doesn't have the ability to be hand flown in emergency? Is it to do with cap-badge politics and the RA not wanting to call the operators 'pilots' because that's going into AAC/RAF territory?

Strange that despite that 'non pilot' status and no controls, they are still paying loads to give their operators air experience and air awareness training in a light fixed wing.

[Bing]

Why would you have a UAV that doesn't have the ability to be hand flown in emergency?

Reduced training burden? If it can be hand flown in an emergency then you'd have to train the operators to hand fly it which would lead to an increase in flying hours etc. etc.

[chopper2004]

At Farnborough, outside the Thales Chalet I took a photo of WKX with pylons,

cheers

http://i57.photobucket.com/albums/g209/longranger/longranger142/IMG_5388_zpsken44cl5.jpg

[Lala Steady]

Reduced training burden? If it can be hand flown in an emergency then you'd have to train the operators to hand fly it which would lead to an increase in flying hours etc. etc. Instead, they have crashed 2 and will continue to have problems in poor weather when the automatics struggle. And they are already spending time and money flying their operators to make them air- aware and air-experienced.