The Scorpion is a tandem-seat twinjet aircraft with an all-composite material fuselage designed for light attack and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions. Production costs were minimized by using common commercial off the shelf technology, manufacturing resources and components developed for Cessna’s business jets; such as the flap drive mechanism is from the Cessna Citation XLS and Cessna Citation Mustang, the aileron drive mechanism is from the Citation X.[3][6][7][8][25] Textron AirLand calls the Scorpion an ISR/strike aircraft, instead of a “light attack” aircraft. The joint venture also states the Scorpion is intended to handle “non-traditional ISR” flights such as those performed by U.S. fighters in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Scorpion is designed to cheaply perform armed reconnaissance using sensors to cruise above 15,000 ft, higher than most ground fire can reach, and still be rugged enough to sustain minimal damage.[26]
The Scorpion is designed to be affordable, costing US$3,000 per flight hour, with a unit cost expected to be below US$20 million.[22]
Vs F-16 “more recent variants starting at $25 to $30 million but potentially reaching $60 to $70 million with improvements.” and $22,000 per hour.
Vid of it https://youtu.be/q7qwQGksyPk
They hope it will replace the A-10.
It’ll be somewhere in the 3,000ish kg between it’s dry weight and it’s max take off weight. Also of note to my earlier bit SOCOM got this money directly and will control these planes directly. And the GAO is not happy about it. Especially that SOCOM ordered 75 of them, which is enough to put 10 in each region. Basically they don’t want to have to ferry them around, even though that’s part of their selling point. However I think GAO has the same question I do. What is wrong with the MQ-9 and eight hellfire missiles? What is SOCOM thinking they’re getting into that they need more than the 300 MQ-9 Predators already available largely just to them?
If I had to take a guess the Sky Warden’s ordnance carry isn’t even that much higher than the MQ-9, about 900 kg or 2,000 pounds more. (Max minus dry weight, fuel, and 10 percent for other equipment, less if you want to use drop tanks)