The next Falcon Peak counter-drone exercise will simulate a densely populated urban environment, shifting the U.S. military’s focus from desert testing to the physical, operational and legal challenges of using counter-unmanned-aircraft systems around civilian areas. The exercise is scheduled for about a year after Falcon Peak 26.2, which took place at Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona in September. Breaking Defense reported the planned change after discussions with military officials at the latest exercise.
The move puts collateral damage among the central concerns for the next event. Brig. Gen. Jason Rueschhoff, the U.S. Northern Command operations director, said homeland defense must address threats inside the country as well as those approaching from outside. “The big things for us to be focused on will be collateral damage issues,” he said during Falcon Peak 26.2, according to Breaking Defense.
Falcon Peak 26.2 was the fourth iteration of the exercise and the first to bring together NORTHCOM, the Defense Innovation Unit, the Army-led Joint Interagency Task Force 401 and the Department of Homeland Security. At Yuma, participants tested methods for neutralizing drones in open desert conditions, including electronic means and systems that could destroy them. The exercise also exposed equipment to heat, wind and sand, factors that can affect counter-drone systems.
The urban version will add obstacles that the open range largely lacks. Marine Col. Scott Humr, JIATF 401’s deputy director of science and technology, said dense buildings and other physical barriers can interfere with signals and block the line of sight required by conventional radars and cameras. He also described urban operations as more complicated because they involve physical, operational and legal constraints that are not present on an open test range.
Those constraints include domestic policies, jurisdictional boundaries and heightened concerns about collateral damage. The military’s response is expected to place greater emphasis on low-collateral and non-kinetic options. Humr said that while a shotgun can be used against a quadcopter in an open desert setting, the Pentagon and JIATF 401 will focus in an urban environment on approaches that make populated areas as safe as possible.
The next exercise will also involve closer coordination among agencies. Humr identified a highly coordinated interagency approach as a primary lesson from the Yuma event, with particular attention to cooperation with the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Aviation Administration. That coordination is relevant because counter-drone operations can involve domestic policies and jurisdictional boundaries as well as military capabilities.
The issue was highlighted in February, when the FAA shut down airspace around the El Paso, Texas, airport. The closure was later linked to a miscommunication among federal agencies involving the use of a counter-drone laser by Customs and Border Protection that had been loaned by the Army, Breaking Defense reported. Military officials have since emphasized coordination with the FAA, including work connected to an agreement for a laser system intended to protect the southern border. Brig. Gen. Matt Ross, the JIATF 401 commander, said the task force and the broader military continue to coordinate testing with the aviation agency.
Falcon Peak 26.2 included demonstrations of radars, interceptor drones, autonomous gun systems and other technologies intended to counter small unmanned aircraft. Defense News reported that the Army detected 378 drone incursions in the preceding 30 days in the southern-border area. Military officials also said 11 cartel drones had been downed with lasers since the technology was deployed there in August.
The next Falcon Peak will take that counter-drone work into a setting with buildings, civilian activity and more complicated coordination requirements. Rueschhoff said the event would be “really telling for capabilities” and would address more than the border. Its significance will lie in how the military and its agency partners adapt counter-drone operations to conditions that differ substantially from an open test range.