The Air Force has issued a “stop work” on the airship known as the Blue Devil, which was to be an “optionally manned surveillance” dirigible.  This is interpreted as the lead-in to the demise of the program.

The Blue Devil 2 was considered to be a herald of next-generation persistent intelligence collection with a potential endurance of more than nine days. Depending on the duration of the mission, the airship would have been able to carry 2,500 pounds of surveillance equipment for five days, or 7,500 pounds if the sortie was shortened to three days.

The CEO of Mav6, Blue Devils’ creator, is David Deptula — formerly LtGen Deptula, deputy chief of staff for ISR and an unusually fervent advocate for UAVs.  It seems he found his civilian calling. The Navy was also researching similar airships.  In an interesting bit of timing, their program just got extended.

The cancellation may render moot Michael Weinstein’s likely offense at the religious reference in the aircraft’s name…