Deep-diving into Anduril’s new Thunder tilt-rotor, attack drone

Anduril has unveiled its newest large tilt-rotor, attack drone, dubbed “Thunder,” that is meant to engage targets as a loyal wingman for Apache helicopters or operate as an autonomous offensive or defensive asset.

Anduril has made significant inroads with Pentagon acquisitions since its launch in 2017. Today, the company is already producing the YFQ-44 Fury AI-piloted collaborative combat aircraft for the U.S. Air Force; reusable Roadrunner M jet-powered interceptors for the U.S. Navy; thousands of low-cost Barracuda 500M cruise missiles for multiple customers; and a long list of other UAS and counter-UAS systems.

But Thunder represents a new area of focus for Anduril.

As a large Group 5 unmanned system (typically defined as a drone that weighs more than 1,320 pounds and is capable of flying over 18,000 feet in altitude) this new tilt-rotor attack aircraft may be among the largest aircraft Anduril has fielded to date.

While few details are known about Thunder, Anduril gave Sandboxx News the opportunity to speak with members of the drone’s design team prior to the platform’s unveiling.

Thunder was developed by Anduril in partnership with Archer Aviation, which specializes in electric vertical take-off and landing, or eVTOL, platforms like the six-rotor Midnight air taxi. Anduril says that partnership with Archer has allowed them to field a hybrid electric propulsion system to power Thunder’s two tilt-rotor props.

While Anduril would not disclose the platform’s exact size, payload capabilities, or range, the firm’s senior vice president of engineering, Shane Arnott, confirmed to Sandboxx News that the aircraft was designed specifically to deliver a similar payload to today’s AH-64 Apache attack helicopter, but at the significantly higher speeds and ranges of the Army’s MV-75 Cheyenne tilt-rotor aircraft (formerly known as the V-280 Valor during its prototype stage).

Specifically, the MV-75’s cruising speed is listed as around 320 miles per hour and that’s likely to be closer to what Anduril’s Thunder can muster with its unique hybrid-electric propulsion system; and the MV-75’s range is somewhere between 580 and 920 miles with a combat load.

An MV-75 Cheyenne aircraft. Anduril said that Thunder will have similar range and speed to the MV-75 Cheyenne. (Photo courtesy of Bell)

Thunder has a primary internal primary weapon bay which opens on either side of the airframe, as well as an additional nose weapons bay meant specifically for counter-drone defensive systems.

The primary internal payload bay can house up to 10 Hellfire missiles, notably two more than can be carried by an MQ-9 Reaper. In place of those Hellfires, Thunder could also sling up to 10 AGM-179 Joint Air-to-Ground Missiles, also known as the JAGM, which are more modern Hellfire replacements that carry both millimeter-wave radar and laser seekers to strike a wide variety of potential targets.

And if the roughly five to seven mile ranges offered by Hellfires and JAGMs aren’t sufficient, Thunder could also accommodate 10 of Anduril’s own Barracuda 100Ms which are incredible Hellfire-sized turbojet-powered missiles with a 120 nautical miles range.

In a drone-defense role, Thunder could forego any Hellfires or similar missiles in favor of four M261 19-tube rocket pods capable of employing the new AGR-20, also known as the Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System II.

These low-cost air-to-air weapons are based on the unguided 70mm Hydra rocket, with a new guidance section added to allow for laser or even infrared seekers. This effectively turns the roughly six-foot Hydras into very inexpensive missiles meant for engaging one-way attack drones like Iran’s Shahed-136 or Russia’s equivalent Geran 2. With a maxxed-out counter-drone loadout of AGR-20s, a single Thunder attack drone could take out as many as 76 drone targets.

Thunder is also capable of carrying up to four quad-pack canisters for Air Launched Effects, which is Pentagon-language for small air-launched drones and loitering munitions like Anduril’s tube-launched Altius 600 and 600M.

As for the nose weapons bay, Anduril claims it can house up to a dozen counter-UAS effectors, though they have not disclosed which effectors they may be referring to. However, in actual combat operations, it’s likely that Thunder would carry some combination of weapons, as we see depicted in Anduril’s marketing materials.

Thunder’s weapons bay. (Anduril)

Based on what Anduril has disclosed about the platform’s armament we can determine its minimum potential payload capabilities.

Ten Hellfires, for instance, would weigh in at roughly 1,080 pounds, while four M261 rocket pods packed full of AGR-20s would weigh more like 2,758 pounds. Including counter-UAS effectors in the nose, we are approaching the maximum payload capacity figures for the most modernized Apaches, which can range between 3,400 and 4,400 pounds, according to its manufacturer, Boeing.

Anduril envisions Thunder operating in conjunction with crewed helicopters as a drone wingman. So, Thunder should be viewed as a proposed extension to the Army’s existing Apache fleet, meant to operate in much the same way, but over potentially greater ranges.

Thunder will be outfited with Anduril’s Lattice AI autonomy suite. Because of the high degree of autonomy provided by Lattice, the company proposes teaming each of the Army’s existing 800 plus Apaches with three Thunder attack drones, effectively delivering roughly three times the firepower without risking any additional pilots.

Arnott also mentioned teaming one Apache with as many as six Thunder attack drones, each operating with sufficient automation to take simple commands from their human counterparts.

And while not a focal point of Anduril’s marketing so far, Thunder could also serve as heavily armed wingmen for MV-75s ferrying troops through the battlespace at higher speeds and longer ranges than any Apache could support, using a variety of both passive and active onboard sensors and its autonomy hardware to continuously detect, classify, and track terrain, obstacles, and any pop-up threats along the way. That onboard multi-modal machine perception stack can identify targets, alert nearby operators, and combine that visual navigation capability with inertial guidance and terrain-feature mapping to operate inside GPS-jammed environments without losing its way.

Related: Marines turn H-1 helicopters into drone motherships

A U.S. Army AH-64 Apache attack helicopter takes off in the Middle East during routine flight operations. The Apache is equipped with sensors, avionics, and weapons systems designed to support reconnaissance and aerial security missions. (U.S. Army photo)

Anduril says its Thunder attack drone will make its first flight within 2027 but that the autonomy suite has already been flying for some time in surrogate rotorcraft.

Once fielded, the entire drone system can be transported inside a standard 40-foot ISO container to be deployed anywhere in the world on short notice: it needs no runways and only minimal support to be put into action.

It seems likely, then, that the Thunder likely offers slightly less total payload than an Apache, which is known to carry up to 16 Hellfires in dedicated air-to-ground loadouts.

And it’s important to keep in mind that more range can often translate into extended loiter times when staying local, potentially giving Thunder the ability to remain airborne looking for inbound attack drones to engage.

However, as promising as Thunder may be it’s largely still a paper plane – meaning it’s capabilities and performance are still notional until the rotorcraft actually starts racking up flight hours in testing sometime in the next year.

Further, the U.S. Army has not expressed any specific interest in fielding a large, tilt-rotor attack rotorcraft to supplement its Apache fleet. In a real way, Anduril is pitching Thunder to the Pentagon as a solution to what are, objectively, very real problems, but not necessarily problems the military is ready to throw money at addressing.

So, Anduril may be out on a bit of a limb with Thunder, but based on the long list of relatively low-cost and high-capability systems the company has already gotten into service in recent years, we certainly shouldn’t count Thunder out – especially considering 18 other countries also operate Apache helicopters, and might well be interested in what Thunder could offer.

Feature Image: Anduril’s Thunder drone. (Anduril)

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