Moog Inc. is excited to announce the first unmanned flight of the S250 multirotor testbed aircraft. The successful first flight marks a significant milestone in developing Moog’s HE350 Recluse multi-mission unmanned vehicle. This autonomous hybrid electric vehicle is an evolution of Moog’s S250 flight testbed, which is currently participating in the USAF AFWERX Prime Programs.

The S250 program will directly benefit the development of the autonomous capability of the HE350 Recluse to enable agile, predictive, and precision sustainment in contested environments while allowing the warfighter to remain in a covert position. The point-and-click navigation capability of the Recluse allows for optional mission execution by an operator as opposed to a highly skilled pilot.

The high-integrity system design architecture of the vehicle makes it much safer than what is considered standard in a drone. With a reconfigurable payload capacity of 500 lbs. and a 144 nautical mile range, the vehicle can safely support missions like logistics and tactical resupply, multi-mission capability, mobile electric power, fire suppression, and humanitarian relief.

Michael Brunner, Director of Moog’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems, said, “Our team continues to make great progress on our path to fully autonomous flight. The knowledge gained from these flight tests is informing our parallel development effort to bring the reconfigurable Moog HE350 Recluse to the warfighter, transforming battlefield logistics while providing numerous other mission sets.”