nEUROn The great European Programme

Source: Finmeccanica Magazine Aeronautics no.1

With a share of 22%, Alenia Aeronautica is the main partner of nEUROn programme.

The nEUROn program envisages the implementation of a UCAV (Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle) which will ne flying in Europe in 2012. Launched by the French Ministry of Defence and supported by Italy, Sweden, Spain, Greece and Switzerland, nEUROn is developing new technologies and laying the foundation for future European programmes involving military aircraft. 

The systems (aircraft and ground control systems) are intended to demonstrate its qualifying technological capacities in flight to carry out air-ground attack missions in a complex command and control network, perform missions with a good probability of survivability without being detected by hostile radar and infrared systems; release loads over objectives from internal cabins and conduct a mission by identifying and recognising a real radar threat in poor observational conditions. The Programme, lead by Dassault Aviation, sees Alenia Aeronautica in the role of main industrial partner, which, with a 22% share and responsibility in terms of both systems and subsystems. The other industrial partners are Saab, EADS Casa, HAI and Ruag. Alenia Aeronautica's commitment as national leader will hold during all the phases of the programme, from the planning to production and to the testing activities, including several systems: electrical generation and distribution, air data and systems connected to combat capability, which include doors and mechanisms for the weapon bays and the Smart Integrated Weapon Bay - SIWB. Alenia Aeronautica has developed stealth technologies pertaining to its own systems and has created representative mock-ups of the application on the aircraft to verify its ability to meet very stringent requirements. Algorithms are being developed for the "air data" system to derive the flight parameters, and a non-traditional approach has been adopted based on drill plates and in accordance with the aircraft to achieve stealth. The SIWB guarantees, through a mission system developed by Alenia Aeronautica, the ability to conduct the entire attack phase on autopilot, planning it and eventually re-planning it to vary according to the tactical situation. It also handles the automatic recognition of objectives on the ground by means of an infrared sensor, a image recognition software, provided by SELEX Galileo. The nEUROn, launched in 2006, closed the development phase and initiated the production phase that will be accompanied by intense integration and testing activities of various systems and subsystems. The test flights, which will be conducted in France, ltaly and Sweden, will begin in 2012 and will conclude in 2013 . In particular, the flight demonstrations associated with the SIWB will be conducted in Italy, at the Command polygon at Salto di Quirra in Sardinia.