Self-driving tech, AI and more: Millions in defense contract work coming to Hurlburt and Eglin

Jim Thompson, Northwest Florida Daily News
·5 min read

HURLBURT FIELD — A San Diego-based company working on self-driving technology and artificial intelligence for the piloting of military aircraft will work at Hurlburt Field for the next 18 months under a $15 million contract for research and development in unmanned aerial systems operations.

According to a recent award announcement from the Department of Defense (DoD), the contract — actually a modification on an existing contract — calls for defense technology firm Shield AI's research and development efforts to focus on the support of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations conducted on the ground by special operations forces.

In case you missed it: Boeing selects Fort Walton Beach for competitive $2.5M expansion project

By the way: US Rep. Matt Gaetz pushing for military housing allowance hikes in Northwest Florida

Hurlburt Field to get support of defensive cybersecurity operations

Hurlburt Field is the headquarters of Air Force Special Operations Command (AFSOC), which supplies an array of capabilities to special operations troops across all of the country's military services. The contract with Shield AI was awarded through the 765th Specialized Contracting Flight at Hurlburt.

In other recent defense contracting activity involving Hurlburt, Canadian Commercial Corporation, headquartered in Ottawa, has been awarded a seven-year, $70 million contract for work involving infrared sensor components aboard the AC-130 four-engine multi-role turboprop aircraft, a mainstay of AFSOC operations.

U.S. Air Force Airman 1st Class Kristina Fields, 4th Aircraft Maintenance Unit weapons load crew member, inspects the weapons rack of a AC-130J Ghostrider as U.S. Air Force Senior Airman Rachel Rolling, 1st Special Operations Wing’s Weapons Load Crew of the 4th Quarter Competition evaluator, observes Jan. 7, 2022 on the flightline at Hurlburt Field.

In addition to work at Hurlburt and at Cannon Air Force Base in New Mexico, the contract will cover repair of the sensors while aircraft are deployed, according to a DoD contract award announcement.

Other defense contracting activity involving Hurlburt includes part of a recent $34.3 million contract award to Telos Corporation in Ashburn, Virginia, for support of defensive cybersecurity operations. In addition to Hurlburt, some of the work under the contract awarded by the Air Force's Air Combat Command will be done at Tyndall Air Force Base in Panama City, along with a number of other Air Force bases across the country and in overseas locations.

Previous awards: Northwest Florida businesses earn numerous recent military contracts

Local economy booming: Military moves, strong tourism could make 2022 a banner economic year locally

Eglin AFB to get engineering services for electronic warfare systems testing

Beyond the defense contracting work coming to Hurlburt, a Virginia-based defense technology company will be doing $18 million of work at Eglin Air Force Base under a five-year contract awarded recently by the Air Force Test Center at the base.

The contract calls for Peraton Inc. of Reston, Virginia, to provide ongoing engineering services for testing of electronic warfare systems used aboard the B-1B and B-52 bombers, according to a DoD announcement.

Other work coming to Eglin includes an $11.8 million modification to an existing contract with Lockheed Martin Aeronautics. The contract modification covers maintenance and other services at a laboratory on Eglin where electronic systems aboard the F-35 fighter used by Norway and Italy are reprogrammed. The work is expected to continue through December of this year, according to the DoD contract award announcement. The contract was awarded by Naval Air Systems Command.

In this 2020 photo, a crew chief guides an F-35 stealth fighter jet in for refueling at Eglin Air Force base. The F-35 is the focus of some of the recent military contracting activity involving bases and businesses in Northwest Florida.
In this 2020 photo, a crew chief guides an F-35 stealth fighter jet in for refueling at Eglin Air Force base. The F-35 is the focus of some of the recent military contracting activity involving bases and businesses in Northwest Florida.

Also in connection with the F-35, Tyndall will be the site of a small percentage of the work to be done under a $145 million contract modification awarded by the DoD to Connecticut-based Raytheon Technologies Corporation's Pratt and Whitney Military Engine.

The work, involving maintenance support for the F-35, is slated to run through September 2024, with 1% of the job scheduled for Tyndall.

Work coming to area companies under recent defense contracts includes a $7.6 million task order issued to Florida Power and Light Company for implementation of energy improvements at Naval Air Station Pensacola, according to the DoD. The work under the Navy contract is slated for completion by December of next year, according to the contract award announcement.

Other defense contracting work

Other defense contracting work coming to local companies includes part of a $49.5 million contract awarded by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for various military and civil projects in the midwestern United States. BCI Construction USA Inc., headquartered in Pace, will compete with two other companies, one in Illinois and the other in Washington, for a share of the work under the five-year contract, according to the DoD.

Also locally, the Fort Walton Beach operations of California-based Kratos Unmanned Aerial Systems Inc. will get part of the work awarded to the company under a $51 million modification to an existing contract for providing 50 aerial targets to the Navy, with a handful of other targets slated for delivery to Japan and Saudi Arabia.

According to a contract award announcement, slightly less than 5% of the work under the two-year contract will be performed in Fort Walton Beach.

Similarly, 2% of the work to be done by Sikorsky, part of Lockheed Martin, under a $30.7 million contract for spare parts for the CH-53K heavy-lift helicopter, will be done at the Fort Walton Beach facilities of Lockheed Martin. According to the DoD, the work is scheduled for completion in December of 2026.

In other contracting activity with a local connection, the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center (AFLCMC) at Eglin has recently awarded millions of dollars in contracts to Tucson, Arizona-based Raytheon Missiles and Defense. The awards to Raytheon include, among others, a $92 million outlay for StormBreaker bombs.

The AFLCMC also recently awarded a $50 million contract to the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, "for advanced development, acquisition and test and evaluation of aerospace systems, to include munitions, cyber warfare and electronic warfare elements," according to a DoD announcement. Work under the contract is scheduled for completion by July 31, 2026.

And finally, the AFLCMC awarded a $9.5 million contract to a communication systems division of L3 Technologies in Salt Lake City, Utah, for the prototyping of an electronic data link to be used with an air-to-surface missile already in the U.S. military inventory.

This article originally appeared on Northwest Florida Daily News: Hurlburt, Eglin give local companies millions in defense contract work