Gremlins Returned Safely to Base But Failed to Complete Their Mission

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Recent attempts by the US military to retrieve swarming drones have failed. The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency DARPA has been leading the Gremlins program – turning cargo aircraft like the C-130 into motherships capable of launching and retrieving swarms of small drones. 

During a recent series of flight tests, DARPA made nine attempts to recover three X-61A Gremlins Air Vehicles in flight. Each failed, the agency said in a news release, which characterized the effort as “just inches from success.”

The tests marked the first time DARPA has attempted to recover the Gremlins drones — made by Leidos subsidiary Dynetics — via a capture device mated to the same C-130 that deployed the air vehicles. 

During a successful recovery, the C-130 would lower a docking bullet that helps stabilize each vehicle from the turbulence generated by the C-130. Once in place, an engagement arm would grab the X-61A and drag it into the C-130′s cargo bay.

During tests, the Gremlins drones were never able to mechanically engage with the docking station because the “relative movement was more dynamic than expected and each GAV, ultimately, safely parachuted to the ground,” DARPA stated.

DARPA said they came within inches of connection on each attempt but, ultimately, it just wasn’t close enough to engage the recovery system.

Over three flights, each X-61 flew for more than two hours, allowing DARPA to further validate the drone’s ability to operate autonomously. The agency also collected “hours of data” that will help it to understand aerodynamic interactions between the Gremlins drone and the capture device, which program officials will study to understand how the system needs to be modified, as reported by defensenews.com.