Two sleek, stealthy aircraft are majestically poised on the runway at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., ready to take to the skies. Nicknamed “Stingray 1” and “Stingray 2,” what distinguishes these Boeing Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems X-45A vehicles from other aircraft at the base isn’t just their futuristic, Hollywood-esque look.

They will revolutionize the future of flight and warfare.

Boeing is making history with the unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAV) that operate on a complex computer system. These aircraft can engage in high-threat combat missions, while the pilot safely carries out the mission from a remote ground location anywhere in the world.

The Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems (J-UCAS) program is changing air combat missions as we know them. The UCAV concept of “fly-by-mouse” means the pilot sits at a ground station instead of a cockpit and manages multiple vehicles in high-threat combat missions with a computer mouse instead of a stick and rudder. The pilot’s view is a computer console instead of the combat-zone skies.

At NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards, Boeing has been testing and developing the X-45A to show it’s possible to successfully have one pilot on the ground control more than one autonomous aircraft.

The X-45 program is a joint effort of the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy and Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, which also involves NASA. It demonstrates the technical feasibility, military utility and operational value of a networked system of high-performance, unmanned air vehicles.

When DARPA awarded Boeing the UCAV contract in 1999, Boeing structured the X-45A program as a series of demonstrations that evolved into four phases—gradually increasing mission complexity into the autonomous system. This led to four major phases of software testing and associated demonstrations, including command and control, contingency management, logic and decision-making, weapons release and multi-vehicle communications and operations.

On May 22, 2002, Boeing’s X-45A demonstrator made aviation history with its first flight at Edwards. This marked the creation of the first autonomous unmanned system designed and built for combat operations in a network-centric environment. Since then, Boeing and the X-45A team have accomplished all required flights and ground demonstrations.

“The X-45A program has proven it is possible for a single pilot to manage multiple vehicles and for air vehicles to communicate with each other and make real-time decisions that lead to effective prosecution of an attack,” said Jim Martin, Boeing director, J-UCAS X-45 System Test.

The next step is to transition from the X-45A model, designed as an experimental aircraft, to the more capable J-UCAS X-45C model significantly increasing warfighter’s effectiveness in missions such as suppression of enemy air defenses, airborne electronic attacks and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance.

Boeing will build and flight test three X-45C aircraft, two mission control elements and will integrate the J-UCAS Common Operating Systems that will allow unmanned aircraft systems to operate with each other globally. In 2006, Boeing is expected to complete the assembly of the first X-45C, with flight testing scheduled to begin in 2007.

“The J-UCAS X-45C continues Boeing’s proud heritage in unmanned systems and becomes the first member of a family of combat unmanned system,” said Darryl Davis, Boeing Global Strike Solutions vice president. “It is a very affordable, highly effective warfighting system that operates both autonomously and cooperatively with manned systems in a networked combat environment.”

It seemed an impossible goal: create software and a network of systems for an unmanned aircraft that would undertake highly complex, yet-to-be-determined combat missions. A Boeing team of systems engineers, software designers, mission planners and test pilots developed the computer software system of the Boeing Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems X-45 program, dramatically altering the future of flight.

When the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency awarded Boeing the UCAV contract in 1999, Boeing structured the program leading to four major phases of software development, testing and associated flight demonstrations, including logic and decision-making, human systems integration and flight planning.

“Boeing’s X-45 team is doing things that no one has done before,” said Gary Little, Boeing J-UCAS program deputy for mission systems software. “Inventing the state of the art is a challenge, and it’s exciting that we’re moving the frontier.”

The lessons learned and the advanced capabilities of the software developed and tested on the X-45A will transition to the X-45C in addition to a new set of requirements to bring unmanned flight to the next level.