MQ-1C Gray Eagle

The US Army's armed medium-altitude, long-endurance uncrewed aircraft for persistent surveillance, targeting, electronic warfare and precision strike.

Overview

The General Atomics MQ-1C Gray Eagle is a reusable medium-altitude, long-endurance uncrewed aircraft developed from the MQ-1 Predator family for the US Army. It combines electro-optical and infrared surveillance, synthetic-aperture and ground-moving-target radar, signals intelligence, communications relay and precision-strike functions in a platform designed to operate with Army aviation formations. Its four hardpoints can carry AGM-114 Hellfire missiles, while its sensor feeds can support reconnaissance, target acquisition and manned-unmanned teaming with AH-64 Apache helicopters.

Unlike the larger turboprop MQ-9 Reaper, the Gray Eagle uses a heavy-fuel piston engine. The original aircraft was followed by the longer-endurance Gray Eagle Extended Range, the open-architecture Gray Eagle 25M and the ship- and austere-site-oriented Gray Eagle STOL. General Atomics states that the family has accumulated more than one million operational hours and supports automatic takeoff and landing as well as control through multiple satellite-orbit architectures in its modernized configuration.

The aircraft remains in US service, but its long-term force structure is unsettled. The Army announced in 2025 that it would cancel procurement of older Gray Eagles as part of a broader transformation initiative, while subsequent planning retained newer variants, funded modernization and pursued a short-takeoff or vertical-takeoff successor. Congress has separately supported Gray Eagle 25M procurement for the Army National Guard.

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