Centered

By Marjorie Censer / August 17, 2009 at 5:00 AM

The Army is in standing up a new center intended to improve the efficiency of its unmanned aircraft system efforts, service officials said last week.

At a conference in Washington, Tim Owings, the Army's deputy program manager for UAS, told reporters that the Army is relocating a number of its unmanned systems, including Shadow, Hunter and Sky Warrior, to Dugway Proving Ground, UT.

The consolidated site at Dugway is called the Rapid Integration and Acceptance Center, Owings said, and will include acceptance testing, logistics support, contractor training and quick reaction fielding, among other capabilities, according to his briefing slides.

Owings said he expects the consolidation at RIAC to "reduce the time line by about 75 percent in terms of integration time lines."

His briefing slides indicate that RIAC will be activated this fall, and Owings said the consolidation effort there will be complete 12 to 18 months from now.

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