Testing
Insitu Inc. announced that the Small Tactical Unmanned Aircraft System (STUAS) Integrator completed its first Operational Assessment (OA-1), a critical milestone in the STUAS program execution. During OA-1, the STUAS Integrator system flew mission scenarios designed to assess operational suitability of the current Integrator UAS. The STUAS programme
Testing
Northrop Grumman's Fire Scout achieved a single-day endurance flight record of 18 hours in U.S. Navy anti-piracy operations. The vertical takeoff and landing tactical UAV, which provides intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance data, was launched from the USS Halyburton, part of the Navy's 5th
Testing
Northrop Grumman Corporation's Relative Navigation system exceeded accuracy requirements during recent flight tests for the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory's Automated Aerial Refuelling (AAR) programme. The tests were conducted in collaboration with the Air Force Flight Test Center's Test Operations Combined Test Force,
Testing
Indra’s Pelican rotary wing UAS has received the Special Airworthiness Certificate (CAEE) by the Spanish State Aviation Safety Agency, a body within the Ministry of Public Works, to perform integration, test and demo flights. The certificate, first awarded in Spain for rotary wing UAS, implies that the Pelican system
Testing
An $86.2 million contract award last month reveals that the US Air Force will seek to prove if airships can replace fixed-wing aircraft on some surveillance missions over Afghanistan. About nine months after the US Army launched its long-endurance multi-intelligence vehicle (LEMV) programme, the air force
Testing
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) will award a sole source cost-plus-fixed-fee contract to New Mexico State University Physical Sciences Laboratory (NMSU/PSL). This contract is for the acquisition of facilities, materials and support for flight testing for the Vulture programme flight demonstrator (FD) air vehicle.
Electronic Sub-Systems
Students at MIT have developed a real-time visual odometry system that can use a Kinect to provide fast and accurate estimates of a vehicle's 3D trajectory. This system is based on recent advances in visual odometry research, and combines a number of ideas from the state-of-
Testing
Electromagnetic interference (EMI) testing on the European version of Northrop Grumman's Global Hawk– the Euro Hawk – was performed recently by engineers with the 772nd Test Squadron at the Benefield Anechoic facility (BAF) at Edwards Air Force Base, California. Northrop Grumman and German government representatives participated as well. Although
Testing
Filmed at Zurich’s Institute for Dynamic Systems and Control inside the Flying Machine Arena, two Quadrotors demonstrate their extreme manoeuvrability by playing ball with a human, then with each other…
Propulsion
Stuttgart-based Festo claims to be inspired by nature, having deciphered bird flight with its Smart Bird. The ‘bird’ is highly aerodynamically efficient, even turning its head like real gulls do to refine aerobatic turns, and can take off and land by itself. Inspired by the herring gull, the Smart
Commercial
The Welsh Assembly Government has just launched a two year research and development programme to explore the potential for advanced remote sensing, using small unmanned aircraft, for use in land applications, primarily high input arable farming. The programme is called Project URSULA - UAS Remote Sensing for Use in Land Applications.
Military
The AAI RQ-7B Shadow 200 Tactical UAS, which won the prestigious Performance-Based Logistics Award from the Secretary of Defence last autumn, continues to improve performance and efficiency after 600,000 combat hours in Iraq and Afghanistan. "We've taken cost very seriously and we've