Kratos' Gremlins Take to the Sky

Gremlins, a futuristic Pentagon program trying to develop a flying aircraft carrier able to launch and recover drones mid-flight, achieved a key development milestone earlier this month. We're a long way away from seeing the system deployed in an actual combat mission, but the successful test flight is a boost for Kratos Defense & Security Solutions (NASDAQ: KTOS) and, indirectly, Leidos Holdings (NYSE: LDOS).

The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced on Jan. 23 that the Kratos-built X-61A Gremlins Air Vehicle (GAV) flew for the first time back in November. The drone launched from a C-130A transport airplane and flew for one hour and 41 minutes, completing a number of flight demonstrations.

The flight didn't go without a hitch: At the end of the mission the X-61A engine was shut down, as planned, and a parachute was deployed, but the main parachute suffered a mechanical failure and the drone crashed. But the parachute is not part of the expected final design, and both the government and Dynetics, the contractor leading the effort, were pleased with the outcome.

Source Fool.com