Rockwell Collins has been awarded the third phase of a damage tolerance contract by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which will find the Company demo'ing a completely autonomous takeoff, recovery from extreme damage and failure, and autonomous landing of an unmanned subscale F/A-18 with additional flight tests to be conducted on an operational Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS).

Over the course of approximately 15 months, Rockwell Collins will demo its full Damage Tolerance and advanced controls capabilities. Flight tests will demonstrate increasing damage to the subscale F/A-18 and an operational UAS, including the failure of control surfaces and parts of the wing, as well as loss of vertical and horizontal tail surfaces. The flight tests will also include an "engine-out" condition followed by automatic adaptive recovery and emergency autoland. Damage Tolerance Phase III follows Phases I and II, which were completed in April 2008. In Phase II, the technology demonstrated an aircraft could survive catastrophic wing damage, recover its baseline performance, and safely land — all autonomously. This 02:15 video is of the final flight test for Phase II, during which 60 percent of a wing was ejected and the adaptive controls were turned off and on. (Video is courtesy of Rockwell Collins)