Part of a wider restructuring of its aviation units
The 1st Battalion, 501st Aviation Regiment is in the process of converting to become the Army's first heavy attack-reconnaissance squadron as part of a wider restructuring of its aviation units.
This means they are getting Shadow Unmanned Aerial Systems, or drones, to team up with the two dozen AH-64D Apache helicopters the battalion already has.
These drones are not weaponized and will be used for reconnaissance during training exercises and combat missions, said Lt. Col. R.J. Garcia, commander of the 1st Battalion.
The Shadow drones "are capable of being the eyes of the Apaches so we are more efficient and more lethal on the battlefield and we are not putting our air crews in as much risk," Garcia said.
"The drone can send video to the Apache and we can see what the drones are looking at," Garcia added. "It increases our efficiency and it increases the different places we can look at."
The unit will reflag to the 3rd Squadron, 6th Cavalry Regiment in March 2015, but will still be part of the 1st Armored Division's Combat Aviation Brigade.
The Flying Dragons, as the battalion is nicknamed, already have three of the first version of the Shadow, which has proven itself with more than 1 million hours of flight time mostly in Iraq and Afghanistan during the past dozen years, said Lt. Col. Tory Burgess, the product manager for the Shadows based out of Redstone Arsenal, Ala.