A joint group of U.S. military organizations has demonstrated vertical take-off and landing with REALL, a new technology designed to provide low-cost maritime logistics. An MH-60M Blackhawk helicopter landed on the Improved Navy Lighterage System during the demonstration.
The event took place July 13th at Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek in Virginia, with the goal to demonstrate VTOL aircraft landing on a barge platform that stored fuel, the U.S Navy said Tuesday.
Naval Facilities Engineering Command's Engineering and Expeditionary Warfare Center (EXWC), U.S. Central Command, U.S. Transportation Command and Army Engineer Research and Development Center worked together to perform the demonstration.
“As the lead combatant command sponsor and warfighter representative for the REALL project, USCENTCOM’s goal was to demonstrate a littoral logistics sustainment capability for fuel distribution and logistics nodes in support of emerging operational concepts,” said Thomas Smith, J8-ST chief science advisor for advanced concepts at CENTCOM.
The team will further assess REALL's capacity to facilitate maritime logistics via VTOL aircraft.
