Coast Guard awards HC-130J Minotaur Mission System Suite retrofit option, accepts separate HC-130J following Minotaur retrofit

CGNR 2005, an HC-130J Super Hercules long range surveillance aircraft retrofitted with the Minotaur Mission System Suite, departs Waco, Texas, for Air Station Elizabeth City, North Carolina, following its acceptance by the Coast Guard June 14, 2018. U.S. Coast Guard photo by Chief Warrant Officer Ken Norris.

The Coast Guard on June 8 awarded a contract option worth approximately $3.6 million to L3 Technologies Inc. Integrated Systems Platform Integration Division in Waco, Texas, for Minotaur missionization of one HC-130J Super Hercules long range surveillance aircraft. This work will complete the retrofits of the service’s HC-130Js that were previously delivered with the legacy mission system.

Minotaur is a proven, government-owned and -operated mission system architecture, which is also used by the U.S. Navy and U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Minotaur incorporates sensors; radar; and command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance equipment that enables aircrews to gather and process surveillance information for transmission to other platforms and units during flight. The Coast Guard is integrating the mission system across most variants of its fixed-wing aircraft; this process is known as missionization.

The aircraft covered in this option, CGNR 2001, will enter the integration process in early 2019, with delivery scheduled for late 2019. This is the last aircraft in the Coast Guard HC-130J fleet outfitted with the legacy mission system; all new aircraft are being outfitted with the Minotaur mission system upon delivery.

The first aircraft to undergo a retrofit was the Minotaur mission system prototype, CGNR 2003, which was delivered to the fleet June 6, 2017.

The Coast Guard accepted the fourth HC-130J retrofitted with Minotaur from the legacy system on June 14. The aircraft, CGNR 2005, entered missionization at L3 in May 2017, and has returned to Air Station Elizabeth City, North Carolina, to perform operations alongside seven other HC-130Js. The location and missionization status of all Coast Guard HC-130Js is now as follows:

CGNR 2002 is scheduled to be inducted into the Minotaur integration process in Waco in November; the next delivery of a Minotaur-missionized aircraft, CGNR 2006, is planned for the same month.

For more information: HC-130J program page and Minotaur program page