U.S. Army flies C100X drone to sharpen troop training

A U.S. Army program that builds realistic enemy threats for training flew Performance Drone Works’ C100X drone at Fort Indiantown Gap, Pennsylvania, on Sept. 25, testing its thermal camera, its ability to drop inert practice munitions and whether it could be used in future training scenarios.

The flights were carried out by members of the Emerging Threat Replication Program, the U.S. Army said in a photo release from the Pennsylvania National Guard’s training center. The Army did not say what results the testing produced, how many aircraft were flown or when the drone might be added to training events. It also did not describe how the C100X differs from the company’s C100.

PDW builds the C100 as a multi-role quadcopter that can scout, drop munitions, carry cargo or launch smaller first-person-view drones. The U.S. Army has bought C100s for units under a company-level small drone requirement, and soldiers have flown them at the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, California. A PDW official said in January that this effort was laying the groundwork for the Army’s planned Medium Range Reconnaissance drone program, expected to start at the end of fiscal 2026 and into 2027.

In July, during the Army’s Project Convergence Capstone 6 experiment at Fort Irwin, soldiers fitted a C100 with a standardized weapon attachment kit and a conversion kit that lets it drop mortar rounds.

Fort Indiantown Gap, the Pennsylvania National Guard’s 17,000-acre headquarters, has become one of the Army’s main drone training sites. Its Unmanned Aircraft System Training and Innovation Facility was chosen as the primary site for training soldiers on drones bought under the U.S. Department of War’s Drone Dominance Program, and the post has restricted airspace up to 26,000 feet (7,900 m).

The installation has also rebuilt several ranges for drone and counter-drone training this year, adding a mock village made from shipping containers for first-person-view drone pilots and ranges where troops shoot at clay targets and drones with shotguns and machine guns to simulate incoming one-way attack drones. Range staff said they are working to make training match the drones soldiers now face in combat.