Five companies are designing long-endurance ship-based surveillance and strike unmanned aircraft under the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (Darpa) Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node program. TERN is intended to demonstrate the capability to provide Predator-class medium-altitude, long-endurance, unmanned-aircraft capabilities from the flight decks of small ships, primarily the U.S. Navy's Littoral Combat Ship-2 (LCS-2). Phase 1 design contracts have been awarded to Aero Vironment ($2.3 million), Aurora Flight Sciences ($2.8 million), Carter Aviation Technologies ($2.2 million), Maritime Applied Physics ($2.2 million) and Northrop Grumman ($2.9 million). In Phase 1, which runs to next summer, the companies are expected to design objective systems to meet Darpa's goals of an operating radius up to 900 nm with a 600-lb.
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