LAKEHURST — Operating at altitudes up to 20,000 feet, the Army’s new surveillance airship is designed to keep constant watch for roving gunmen and roadside bomb-planters, far out of range of Taliban guns.
“We believe it will be a game-changer for the Army once we get it deployed,” said Kevin Creekmore, chief engineer for the Long Endurance Multi-Intelligence Vehicle, a 302-foot hybrid airship designed to provide soldiers with complete battlefield views from cameras, radars and infrared imaging.
It’s another question whether the $517 million project to build the LEMV will come into the sights of domestic military budget cutters. A similar Air Force project for a long-endurance surveillance airship was canceled in June.
Half a century after the last Cold War blimps were grounded, their old base here is a center for what backers hope will be a revival of military airships. Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst has one of the largest surviving collections of World War II airship hangars, and it’s attracted new airship research focused on giving soldiers more early warning of enemy movements.
“This is one of the few places remaining in the country that has hangars the size we need,” said Bert Race, manager of the military’s only operational airship, the Navy’s MZ-3A. Based on a commercial airship design, the 178-foot blimp was itself nearly grounded last March when the program ran out of military research customers who pay to test equipment in the air.
Race landed a new contract with the Army to test surveillance, communication and other equipment for Army aircraft – including the LEMV, which is running a year behind schedule and just had its first 90-minute test flight Aug. 7.
“We had a close call with running out of funds,” but the Army is committed to testing through March 2013 and the program is pursuing more future customers, Race said.
“If there’s no customers, “ he said. “We’d put the airship into long-term storage.”
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