Norways wants to field long range, long endurance drones on the remote island of Andøya from 2029. The Royal Norwegian Air Force (RNoAF) ceased to operate from the airbase on the island in 2016 but it now plans to re-activate the site.
In the “long term defence plan, 2025 – 2036” paper, released in 2024, Norway has announced its intent of procuring “as part of international cooperation with allies, long-range drones with sensors and systems for monitoring maritime areas of interest in the north”.
A Request For Information has been issued, and both General Atomics and Northrop Grumman have responded with their proposals. At present there are no news about other, alternative entries.
General Atomics is proposing its MQ-9B SEA GUARDIAN, technically a Medium Altitude, Long Endurance machine with an endurance of 30 to 48 hours depending on the payload.
Northrop Grumman’s entry, the MQ-4C TRITON, is the only operational, western, true High Altitude, Long Endurance platform, with a ceiling altitude above 65,000 feet and cruise flying well above 50,000, with a very long endurance and a range unrefueled of over 9,500 nautical miles. Developed specifically for wide area maritime surveillance and ISR to complement the manned P-8 POSEIDON, the MQ-4C is a highly capable machine but is also remarkably expensive. So far, Australia is the only country TRITON has been exported to.
The MQ-9B in its maritime surveillance guise, with added, dedicate radar on the centreline station, has a narrower surveillance field of view but on the other hand potentially offers very significant additional capabilities: unlike TRITON, the MQ-9B was designed from the outset to carry and employ weapons. Moreover, GA-ASI is continuing to work on pods that enable the launch of sonobuoys for underwater, ASW surveillance, whereas the MQ-4C is essentially a surface surveillance asset only.
Norway’s stated intent of operating the drones in cooperation with allies could also favour the MQ-9B, which the United Kingdom’s Royal Air Force employs under the name PROTECTOR. The UK has set up a training facility at RAF Waddington which has recently formed the first MQ-9B crews for Belgium as well as for the RAF itself and would welcome Norwegian crews as well.
The UK has positioned itself as the the lead nation in the MQ-9 International Cooperation Support Partnership which now has 7 participant members (UK, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Spain) and 5 observer nations (Greece, Lithuania, Qatar, Sweden and Norway itself) and it has also been recently confirmed by His Majesty’s Government that the RAF is “working closely with the NATO Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Force to scope options to provide PROTECTOR in support of operations in the Northern Atlantic and Arctic regions”. The potential for cooperation with Norway is clear and it might prove to be an important factor.
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