From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov

Transcript for: Watchdog Report #10: Unmanned Aircraft Systems
Audio interview by GAO staff with Sharon Pickup, Director, Defense Capabilities and Management

Released on: March 26, 2010

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[ Narrator: ] Welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for news and information from the Government Accountability Office. It's March 26, 2010. To reduce risks to pilots and provide flexibility to the military, the Department of Defense has been increasing its investment in unmanned aircraft systems, or UAS. In the last decade, DOD's inventory of UAS has grown from fewer than 50 to more than 6,800. A group led by Sharon Pickup, a Director in GAO's Defense Capabilities and Management team, recently examined the extent to which the Army and the Airforce are prepared to support this expansion of UAS capability. GAO analyst Jeremy Cluchey sat down with Sharon to learn more. 

[ Jeremy Cluchey: ] The Department of Defense is looking to increase the nation's investment in unmanned aircraft systems by over $6 billion this fiscal year. What are these systems and how are the used by the military? 

[ Sharon Pickup: ] Basically these systems do not carry a pilot and they can be preprogrammed to fly on their own or they can be remotely piloted by someone with a joy stick or some other apparatus. So they can fly long duration missions, and battlefield commanders use them for a variety of missions. For example, they can be used to protect U.S. troops by loitering over an area where the troops are operating and used to conduct surveillance of the area, to detect any enemy movements or explosive devices or those kinds of things. They can also be fitted with a missile and carry out strike missions or they can used to identify targets with a laser for future attacks. 

[ Jeremy Cluchey: ] GAO identified some challenges resulting from this rapid expansion of the military's UAS inventory, particularly in the areas of infrastructure and personnel. Can you talk about some of these challenges? 

[ Sharon Pickup: ] Well the bottom line is, that while the inventories are growing, the planning has not kept pace with the inventories such that the military services and in particular the Airforce and the Army have not yet planned for all the types of support needed. For example, in the Airforce the pool of pilots has to be divided between missions that are unmanned and missions that are manned. So, in order to support the unmanned missions, sometimes the Airforce has to draw experienced pilots that normally fly manned aircraft and use them for unmanned systems. They're also experimenting with using personnel who have never been pilots before to operate the unmanned systems. In the case of the Army, what the Army is experiencing is an increase in work load. For example, in the past they operated the unmanned systems from 12 to 16 hours a day and now it's a 24/7 type operation. So their units haven't been organized or manned with enough people to pull those shifts. So they're having to look at in the future increasing the size of the units. Those are just a couple of the challenges. 

[ Jeremy Cluchey: ] The report also discusses challenges related to air space and training. Can you talk a little bit about those challenges? 

[ Sharon Pickup: ] Well, most of the training takes place in the United States. So, because the unmanned systems don't have some of the same features as manned aircraft such as the ability to automatically on their own sense and avoid other aircraft, the FAA is pretty strict about the areas in which the military can fly the unmanned systems. The problem is that as the number of systems grow, the access to airspace is going to grow. So the department is in the process of trying to work with the FAA to mitigate some of the challenges associated with the airspace restrictions. 

[ Jeremy Cluchey: ] How did the Army and Airforce currently approach training personnel on UAS operations and what issues has GAO identified moving forward in that area? 

[ Sharon Pickup: ] Well, ideally the military likes to train as they fight. So ideally you would have Airforce predators, for example, which is the unmanned system that typically supports the ground forces in same proximity as Army ground forces when they train. But the challenge both services face is that a lot of the equipment is deployed overseas. So they don't always have assets available to train on when they're actually at the training centers. 

[ Jeremy Cluchey: ] What steps does GAO recommended DOD take to improve the military support of its expanding UAS capabilities? 

[ Sharon Pickup: ] Well with respect to training, we really have recommended that they come up with this overall results-oriented strategy whereby they have mitigation plans to address the airspace issue for example. And also to make sure that their training is consistent with the environment in which they are operating the unmanned systems and in particular that they have plans for addressing the lack of synchronization between the availability of assets when ground forces are training. 

[ Narrator: ] To learn more, visit GAO's Web site at gao.gov, and be sure to tune in to the next edition of GAO's Watchdog Report for more from the congressional watchdog, the Government Accountability Office.

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