US Air Force designates Collaborative Combat Aircraft as YFQ-42A and YFQ-44A

GA-ASI's Gambit, now designated YFQ-42A. (GA-ASI)

The US Air Force (USAF) has assigned official designations to its Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) models, General David Allvin, the service's chief of staff, announced at the Air & Space Forces Association's (AFA's) annual AFA Warfare Symposium on 3 March. General Atomics Aeronautical Systems' (GA-ASI's) Gambit platform has been designated the YFQ-42A, while Anduril's Fury is now called YFQ-44A.

‘Y' designates a developmental aircraft, while ‘F' stands for ‘fighter,' and the ‘Q' is used for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The numbers that follow show that the craft are the 42nd and 44th types of fighter aircraft designated under the US Department of Defense's (DoD's) Mission Designation Series numbering system. The ‘Y' will be dropped upon production of the first operationally representative aircraft, leaving the CCAs as the first ever aircraft to be designated ‘FQ', or unmanned fighters.

“We're proud to get a new official aircraft designation,” GA-ASI president David Alexander said in a statement.

Anduril and GA-ASI were selected to build CCAs in April 2024, fulfilling a USAF requirement for what the service terms ‘affordable mass' – relatively inexpensive UAVs that can fly in front of manned assets, detecting and destroying targets while the manned aircraft remain far from harm. The first examples of both UAVs are under construction, likely to conduct first flights in the boreal summer of 2025. Entry into operational USAF service is expected in 2030. The USAF intends to purchase at least 1,000 CCAs to complement its F-35s and conceptual Next Generation Air Dominance fighters.

“The designation is evidence of the program's progress,” Jason Levin, senior vice-president of engineering at Anduril, said in a statement.

For more information, please seeUSAF selects Anduril and General Atomics for Collaborative Combat Aircraft prototypes .