Droning on.

At CSCMP’s annual conference, held in San Antonio in late September, Don Reed and Corey Cook of Lockheed Martin talked about drones.

They weren’t talking about Amazon’s notional drone program, but about the performance of a real life unmanned and operational system, the same operational system I blogged about last December.

The KMAX unmanned aerial system (UAS), developed under contract to the Department of Defense by Lockheed Martin and Kaman Aircraft is recently back from Afghanistan after a two and a half year deployment supporting Marines in harm’s way.

Chris Jones, of Descartes Systems, one of DC Velocity’s best practices bloggers and the track chair, was impressed. “They didn’t start over.  They used a proven aircraft and fielded it fast.  You don’t expect that from the Department of Defense.”

The KMAX UAS is a modified version of an FAA certified helicopter, the Kaman Aircraft K-1200.  It flew over 1900 missions in Afghanistan, and could reach 18,000 feet with a payload of half a ton.  At lower altitudes, it can comfortably lift 6,000 pounds.

Based on the success of the KMAX UAS in a combat environment, Lockheed and Kaman are exploring commercial applications in combating forest fires, logging, oil field support in the artic, remote construction sites, or deliveries in other areas with limited transportation infrastructure.  

According to the speakers, autonomous delivery is taking place in Africa already.

Autonomous transport is coming.  Stay tuned.