Army expands test range initiative with two Indiana sites, boosting commercial drone testing options

Army officials announced on Wednesday that it would allow commercial drone companies to use two additional facilities, both of which are in Indiana, to test their products more quickly as part of the Permissive Test Range Expansion Initiative.During an event at the Northeast Indiana Defense Summit, Acting Army Secretary Adam Telle announced that Camp Atterbury Joint Maneuver Training Center and Muscatatuck Training Center would join the list of facilities that private companies could request to use for their own testing.“Under the leadership of President Trump and Secretary of War Hegseth, the Army is throwing open our doors to American innovators and tearing down bureaucratic red tape,” Telle said. “We are accelerating our relationship with American ingenuity, acquiring cutting-edge capabilities and integrating autonomous technologies to ensure the U.S. Army remains the most lethal and dominant land force in human history.” Camp Atterbury, for its part, has dedicated airspace up to 40,000 feet, as live-fire ranges including an 1,800-foot drone launch-and-recovery runway, live-fire shoot houses, breach houses, and more. The Muscatatuck Training Center has a configurable urban infrastructure that allows the testing of drones and counter-drone technology through physical and structural layouts.“Expanding this initiative to Indiana is a win-win for national security and defense innovation,” said Maj. Gen. Pat Gaydon, commanding general of the U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Command. “We are providing the physical space and the robust, restricted airspace that commercial developers need to mature their systems. Our ATEC concierge team is fully integrated with the Indiana National Guard to ensure that private industry has a seamless, collaborative pipeline to build, test and deliver resilient technologies to our warfighters.”The goal of the initiative is to expedite the research, development, and testing timelines for emerging technologies and weapons, such as drones, as the department leans into artificial intelligence, autonomy, and robotics.In August, Telle’s predecessor, Dan Driscoll, first announced the initiative and said at the time five facilities would be available for commercial use.The five ranges that could be reserved are: Dugway Proving Ground in Utah; West Cibola Range, a newly opened component of Yuma Proving Ground in Arizona; Camp Shelby Joint Forces Training Center in Mississippi; Camp Grayling Joint Maneuver Training Center in Michigan; and the Multidomain Training Area range complex, a component of the Africa Multidomain Training and Experimentation Center, in Morocco.THE MILITARY’S $1 BILLION DRON PLAN TO TAKE ON CHINA — AND HOW IT HOPES IT NEVER HAS TO USE THEMEach facility has its own specialties for testing, and companies can apply for space at any of these facilities on testrange.army.mil.Driscoll said at the time of the August announcement that the service would give them access to one of the sites within 30 days, whereas in the past it could take between 12 and 18 months.