Military
A nose-wheel frozen off-center caused an MQ-9A Reaper to crash after landing at a US Africa Command base in May 2015, Air Combat Command investigators found. The remotely piloted aircraft was assigned to the 432nd Wing at Creech AFB, Nev., but operated by the 33rd Expeditionary Special Operations Squadron and
Military
The South Korean military is testing Israeli unmanned aerial vehicles to patrol the Yellow Sea, a high-ranking military official said last week. They will be deployed in early August. The military will deploy drones on the Northern Limit Line (NLL) and is planning to eventually form a UAV squad. The
Military
General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA‑ASI) has announced the successful flight tests of Predator C Avenger, equipped with a MS-177 Electro-optical/Infrared (EO/IR) sensor manufactured by UTC Aerospace Systems. MS-177, an advanced sensor in UTC’s SYERS family of sensors, is a key component that supports GA-ASI’s
Military
UK defence and security company BAE Systems has unveiled plans to build the world’s first autonomous military drone, proposing a scenario where unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) would work alongside conventional manned aircraft. The multinational described a war-plane drone which would advance its existing Taranis model to penetrate through
Military
Reliable sources told India Strategic that the Predator C requirement has been mentioned at a very high level during the current visit of the Indian Prime Minister. Now that India is getting into the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), President Barack Obama will ask the State and Defense Departments to
Propulsion
The US Army plans to release a solicitation for a Block III engine for its Textron Systems RQ-7B Shadow tactical unmanned aircraft system (UAS) later this year, according to the army's product manager for the platform. "We are absolutely doing a full and open competition" for
Military
Amid continuing clashes with ethnic rebels, Myanmar's military is confirmed as having deployed unmanned combat aerial vehicles (UCAVs) for counter-insurgency operations in the north of the Southeast Asian country. First inducted into the inventory of the Myanmar Air Force (Tatmadaw Lay) in 2013 or 2014, one or more
Military
Army Apaches are using a new technology in Afghanistan which enables the attack helicopter crews to view real-time video feeds from nearby drones, control the drones’ flight path and therefore more effectively destroy enemy targets, service officials told Scout Warrior. Manned-Unmanned Teaming, or MUM-T, gives AH-64E Apache attack helicopters an
Military
Textron Systems Unmanned Systems has announced that its Shadow Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System (TUAS) has surpassed one million total flight hours, becoming the only unmanned aircraft system of its size to accomplish this significant milestone. More than 85 percent of these one million flight hours occurred during combat operations. Since
Research
DARPA’s Collaborative Operations in Denied Environment (CODE) program seeks to help the U.S. military’s unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) conduct dynamic, long-distance engagements of highly mobile ground and maritime targets in denied or contested electromagnetic airspace, all while reducing required communication bandwidth and cognitive burden on human supervisors.
Take-Off & Landing
General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA‑ASI) and GKN Aerospace’s Fokker business unit, a Dutch aircraft systems and components manufacturer, have announced that they will collaborate to produce and support landing gear systems for Predator B/MQ-9 Reaper RPA systems. Fokker is GA-ASI’s Dutch in-country partner. GA-ASI and
Testing
A prototype of Piaggio Aero's P.1HH Hammerhead unmanned air vehicle crashed into the sea near Sicily during a test flight on 31 May. The P180 Avanti II twin-pusher-derived prototype – registration CPX621 – was operating from Vincenzo Florio airport in Trapani, Sicily. It is believed to have lost communication