24 | Janes International Defence Review March 2012 idr.janes.

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U
K-based Hybrid Air
Vehicles (HAV) is touting
its optionally manned
heavier-than-air airship as a
low-cost surveillance tool in the
continuing ght against piracy
of the East African coast.
Speaking shortly after the
release in early January of a criti-
cal Foreign Afairs Committee
(FAC) report on the international
anti-piracy efort entitled Piracy
of the Coast of Somalia, HAV
executive director and former
Royal Navy (RN) Captain Willie
Pennefather told IHS Janes that
he feels the hybrid air vehicles
time as a wide-area surveillance
platform has come.
He envisaged about half a
dozen unmanned hybrid air
vehicles, each operating at about
20,000 ft above a host frigate,
providing up to 21 days of
continuous wide-area surveil-
lance coverage over roughly two
million km
2
of the Indian Ocean.
Since 2008, the international
community has deployed varying
numbers of warships to the
Indian Ocean in a bid to stem the
loss of shipping to the Somali
pirates. While early eforts did
manage to reduce losses in the
immediate vicinity of the Somali
coast, they had the efect of
pushing the problem further out
to sea.
[HAV] thought we could
[use about six hybrid air vehicles
to patrol] the east coast of
Africa, which is where all the
action was when we started
thinking about it ve years ago.
Of course, as the navy has got
better at patrolling those areas
the action has shifted further
out [to sea], and now its all over
the place right up to Oman,
Pennefather said.
Whereas in 2005 the furthest
recorded attack was around 165
n miles of the Somali coast, in
2010 pirates were attacking ship-
ping as far away as 1,500 n miles.
This latter gure translates into
an area of operations (AO) for the
international naval task forces of
about four million km
2
.
In its report the FAC recog-
nised that this expanded AO
cannot realistically be patrolled
with the current level of assets.
It added that, as any increase in
these assets is unlikely in the
The lack of sufciently wide
area coverage has hampered
operations to combat piracy
Hybrid Air Vehicles
heavier-than-air airship has
been assessed in the
anti-piracy ght off the East
African coasts as a way to
patrol vast areas utilising its
large hull surface area
KEY POINTS
GARETH JENNINGS
SPECIAL REPORT Hybrid air vehicles
A mocked-up image showing how
a hybrid air vehicle could provide a
wide area surveillance capability in
the ght against piracy.
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Wide area surveillance takes to the skies

Copyright 2012 IHS Global Limited.
idr.janes.com March 2012 Janes International Defence Review | 25
current economic climate, the
UK government should explore
alternative technologies, such
as ... lighter-than-air [LTA] per-
sistent wide area surveillance.
Although the FAC specically
refers to LTA technology,
the heavier-than-air hybrid
airship arguably falls into the
same category.
In putting forward his ideas,
Pennefather feels that HAV
can build on the experience the
company has already gained with
the US Armys Long Endur-
ance Multi-intelligence Vehicle
(LEMV) programme, for which it
has provided its soon-to-be-de-
risked HAV 304 hybrid airship.
Built around the same basic
airship design, the maritime
platform would go a long way to
solving the problem of trying to
patrol an area the size of main-
land Europe with a relatively
small number of ships, each of
which is limited to a persistent
radar range of no more than
about 40 miles (shipborne heli-
copters can extend this reach,
but only for very limited periods
at a time).
Wide area surveillance
The anti-piracy mission just
isnt working well enough,
Pennefather said. It isnt working
because the ships
we sent there
are not properly
equipped for
wide area sur-
veillance. It really
is as simple as that.
Pennefather
highlighted the case of
the UK Type 23 frigate HMS
Northumberland, whose deploy-
ment to the Indian Ocean in
April 2010 was featured on the
Discovery Channel.
[HMS Northumberland was]
a really well worked-up ship
with smart, efcient individuals
and a captain who knew exactly
what he was doing. However, he
was never in the right place at
the right time because his radar
range was limited. Available to
[the crew] were the ships radars,
helicopter and intelligence from
other ships in the area. But
together, they failed to provide
a wide enough pattern of life.
According to Pennefather and
HAV, this collaborative pattern
of life intelligence is the key to
defeating the pirates, and the
key to obtaining this intelligence
is persistence.
When operated in an
unmanned mode, the HAV 304
vehicle can remain aloft for
as long as 21 days, providing
around-the-clock surveillance
over about 325,000 km
2
of sea.
A manned xed-wing aircraft,
such as the [RAFs now retired]
Nimrod, could only really provide
about 18 hours of persistent
surveillance, Pennefather said,
adding: This isnt actually very
persistent because you can hang
around doing nothing for 18
hours and then do something on
the nineteenth hour.
If you have 24/7 coverage
over 21 days, which is as good as
it gets [with todays technology],
then nobody can move without
[being seen].
With this persistence, analysts
can then determine patterns of
life over an extended period.
This allows pictures to
be built up regarding the
interactions
of the smaller
pirate boats
and their ocean-going
mother ships and for areas
of particular risk to mer-
chant shipping to be identied.
This would allow time to vector
surface and air assets onto threats,
or advise ships away from threats.
The presence of the HAV would
also have some deterrent value.
Staying on course
A hybrid air vehicle is able to
provide this level of persistence
as approximately 40 per cent of
its lift is provided by the aerody-
namic properties of its shaped
hull, with the remaining 60 per
cent coming from the helium
contained within it. This makes
it extremely efcient as it can
conserve fuel in simply getting
aloft and remaining airborne.
As such, the operating costs of a
hybrid air vehicle are a fraction of
those of other conventional mari-
time patrol assets and provide an
additional advantage over more
conventional types that goes
beyond simple persistence.
Hybrid air vehicles SPECIAL REPORT
The large surface area of its hull
would allow a hybrid airship to
utilise many more sensors and
antennas than would be possible
with a conventional xed- or rotary-
winged platform.
Hybrid Air Vehicles: 1428460

Copyright 2012 IHS Global Limited.
26 | Janes International Defence Review March 2011 idr.janes.com
SPECIAL REPORT Hybrid air vehicles
When coupled with relatively
modest procurement costs,
the hybrid airship becomes an
extremely attractive proposition
to cash-strapped governments,
especially as the technology is
already available of the shelf.
Nations can no longer aford
huge numbers of ships and
lots of expensive kit, such as
[maritime patrol aircraft],
Pennefather told IHS Janes.
[A hybrid air vehicle] is com-
pletely diferent and completely
cost efective. It is cheaper to
build and its operating costs are
about a tenth that of conven-
tional aircraft.
In addition to being more
persistent and cost efective,
a hybrid air vehicle is a more
exible solution when compared
to existing airborne wide area
surveillance assets.
Being optionally manned,
the hybrid air vehicle can transit
controlled airspace en route to
the AO, while an unmanned
aerial vehicle cannot. Also, there
is no need to operate from a
foreign land base, as the vehicle
can be resupplied directly from
a frigate at sea.
Further, the size of the hull
allows for the tting of many
more antennas and sensors than
would otherwise be possible
with other currently available air
assets. As well as providing greater
coverage across a range of sensor
types, it also afords greater sensi-
tivity in their application.
In terms of the payloads
likely to be tted, Pennefather
could not be specic as HAV
is primarily concerned with
the vehicle itself. The payloads,
he said, would be the domain
of an operator or partner
company. Even so, he said that
the vehicle is designed to carry
well over a ton of modular, plug-
and-play, equipment.
With this equipment, the
picture provided by the vehicles
own sensors could then be
combined with those of its host
ship and other hybrid air vehicles
in the AO to provide a protected
corridor of sea about which you
know absolutely everything,
Pennefather told IHS Janes. This
protected corridor will allow mer-
chant vessels to route directly
without having to circumvent
areas of pirate activity, poten-
tially saving billions in operating
costs, insurance premiums and
lost cargo, he contended.
Culture change
According to Pennefather, the
main challenge in selling the
concept of using hybrid air
vehicles as wide area surveil-
lance platforms has been cultural
rather than technical.
Although there is an historical
precedent for using airships in
this manner during the Second
World War US airships operat-
ing over the East Coast forced
German U-boats out to the mid-
Atlantic airships are still seen
as a new technology and require
something of a cultural shift in
the current mindset before they
can be widely accepted.
Even so, Pennefather is con-
vinced that the dual drivers of
increased operational need and
declining defence expenditure
make the hybrid air vehicle a
highly attractive prospect.
For those that get the
concept, it has generated a great
deal of interest as the amount of
money available to the [Ministry
of Defence] reduces, he said,
adding: They are having to think
outside of the box and the clever
people are looking at this.
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While the
international
community has
had an effect on
piracy off the
east coast of
Africa, as dem-
onstrated by this
image of a fast
attack craft be-
ing destroyed by
the UK frigate
HMS Chatham,
the lack of a
persistent wide
area surveil-
lance capabil-
ity has severely
hampered its
ability to be in
the right place
at the right time.
The graphic illustrates
how a number of
hybrid airships work-
ing in concert could
provide a wide area
surveillance capability
over a large swathe of
the Indian Ocean.
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Copyright 2012 IHS Global Limited.