US Air Force Completes XQ-67A Flight Test of Mission Systems and Beyond Line-of-Sight Drone Control

The US Air Force Research Laboratory and Air Combat Command’s Experimental Operations Unit flight-tested the XQ-67A autonomous collaborative aircraft over the Nevada Test and Training Range. Conducted under the Demonstration of ACP Performance and Effectiveness project, the sortie integrated onboard sensors, mission computers, and upgraded power generation and thermal management hardware. Beyond-line-of-sight datalinks were combined with live, virtual and constructive simulation to assess distributed command and control and the exchange of mission information. The General Atomics-built aircraft remains an experimental platform for developing mission systems and autonomy architectures relevant to collaborative combat aircraft, rather than an operational deployment.