Global Hawk Aids Philippine Typhoon Relief

Photo courtesy Northrop Grumman Corp.

By Danielle Lucey



Northrop Grumman announced that its Global Hawk Block 30 unmanned aircraft was used to support the relief effort following Typhoon Haiyan, which devastated the Philippines in November 2013. 



The aircraft, which flew out of Anderson Air Force Base in Guam, used its electro-optical and infrared sensors on three sorties to collect 282 wide-area images of the areas impacted, which occurred between 14 and 20 Nov. The Global Hawk took a total of about 1,000 planned images in addition to ad hoc data collection. 



"Mission planning in a crisis is hard, but having the ability to task and retask Global Hawk gives commanders the flexibility to conduct productive ISR [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] missions that feed near-real-time information to the response teams who need it the most," says Jim Culmo, vice president of the High-Altitude Long-Endurance Enterprise at Northrop Grumman.



Global Hawk has a history of aiding in disaster relief efforts, including United States wildfires, the Fukushima, Japan, nuclear disaster, and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti.