An uncrewed F-250 driven by autonomous software.
Forterra
The US Army is preparing to test autonomous Ford F-250 pickup trucks in a training exercise, part of a broader effort to determine whether familiar commercial vehicles can perform dangerous battlefield jobs without soldiers.Forterra, the defense-technology company supplying the trucks' autonomous-driving system, says that the vehicles could eventually support missions such as route clearance and breaching, work that can require soldiers to spend hours searching mined roads and positioning explosives. The Army's XVIII Airborne Corps plans to experiment with four Forterra-equipped F-250s.Ford's popularity and readily available supply of parts could make the robotic trucks easier to maintain and repair, said Pat Acox, Forterra's vice president of defense.For many military systems, the Pentagon has notoriously complex supply chains for thousands of specialized parts available from only a small number of manufacturers, or in some cases, sole suppliers.Spare part availability and delivery delays have been known to sideline military equipment for months, even years, and have contributed to equipment readiness problems.Forterra's autonomous software is already being integrated into the Marine Corps' Navy-Marine Expeditionary Ship Interdiction System (NMESIS), an anti-ship missile system built on the chassis of the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle.
