File A Fire Scout being assembled at Northrop Grumman's Unmanned Systems Center in Moss Point.

MOSS POINT, Miss. -- The U.S. Army intends to cancel its program to build Fire Scout unmanned aerial vehicles which are assembled by Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems in Moss Point, officials told Congress this week.

The Fire Scout is a vertical takeoff and landing UAV that resembles a helicopter and is used for reconnaissance by the Navy and Army.

Inside Northrop's 110,000-square-foot Unmanned Systems Center, which was the first tenant in the Jackson County Aviation Technology Park in Moss Point, workers assemble the Fire Scouts and manufacture fuselages for the Global Hawk, a high-altitude unmanned reconnaissance plane.

There are eight Army vehicles in various stages of production at the Moss Point facility, Northrop spokeswoman Sherri Pineda said. The center is also working on its 11th Fire Scout for the Navy, she said.

U.S. Rep. Gene Taylor, D-Bay St. Louis, said his office received word of the Army cancellation Tuesday evening and noted that Congress will have the final say on the program when writing defense spending bills in the months to come.

"We're going to look at the merits of it," Taylor said. Northrop "is going to have to build the case -- and I think they can -- that there are good solid returns for the nation's war fighters."

Northrop Grumman "is disappointed the Army has terminated the Class IV MQ-8B Fire Scout UAS, the Army's only vertical unmanned aerial system program of record," the company said in an e-mailed statement.

"Northrop Grumman believes that war fighters have a strong requirement for VUASs to meet their needs in the areas of reconnaissance, surveillance, and target acquisition; communications relay; signal intelligence; and resupply," the company said. "Army Fire Scout will demonstrate these capabilities in this month's Army Expeditionary Warfare Experiment at Ft. Benning, Georgia."

Fire Scout was built under the Army's Future Combat Systems program, which included the development of both air and ground unmanned vehicles.

Last June, the Army cancelled the Future Combat Systems and transitioned into a Brigade Combat Team Modernization program.

This modernization plan sought to reevaluate technologies "in order to accelerate fielding certain capabilities to the Army," according to the letter sent to members of Congress from the Army's Office of Congressional Legislative Liaison.

The Army concluded Fire Scout is no longer required, officials said.

With some upgrades, the Shadow unmanned air system, an existing program, can meet future Army requirements, the letter said.

"All of these restricting steps are being taken to ensure that the Army does not lose time in providing the best possible advantages to its soldiers while remaining ever fiscally responsible to the American citizen," the termination letter said.

Northrop Grumman said Wednesday that it "remains dedicated to providing this unique capability to the soldier in the field."

(Washington bureau reporter Sean Reilly contributed to this report.)