Boeing subsidiary Insitu Inc is awarded a three-year contract for up to 63 RQ-21A Blackjack Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Navy, the U.S. Department of Defense said in a 28 June statement.
Under the contract, potentially worth $390,3 million, also provides for up to six RQ-21A unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) and up to 17 RQ-21A air vehicles for foreign military sales (FMS) customers, including the governments of Canada, Poland and Oman.
The contractor will also provide up to 93 ScanEagle UASs in various configurations, according to the DoD.
In addition, this contract provides for associated services, including training, test and engineering, development of engineering change proposals, operations support, organizational level maintenance, field service representatives, land and ship surveys, hardware site activations, hardware installs, repairs and data.
Work is expected to be completed in June 2022.
The Blackjack is designed to operate off a Marine Expeditionary Unit in support of ground forces deployed worldwide.
The RQ-21A Blackjack can safeguard military bases and activities through a pattern of life identification and explosive device detection. It is equipped with an electro-optic/infrared payload that supports the real-time monitoring to provide indications and threat warnings, and its plug-and-play payloads enable multi-intelligence capability to support a broad range of operations.
The Blackjack provides the warfighter with dedicated day and night intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance coverage, target acquisition, and communication relay via a dedicated and cost effective airborne sensor system capable of delivering actionable intelligence to the tactical commander in real time.