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BAE Systems signs up for UK-French drone BAE Systems has signed an agreement with French defence company Dassault to build a self-piloting drone which will be used by both countries' air forces, as part of the Government's plan to cut defence costs by purchasing more kit with other nations. By Amy Wilson The memorandum of understanding between BAE and Dassault, builder of the Rafale fighter jet, will see the two companies fund a development programme. They hope that will lead to an order from the two governments within the year, to build a demonstrator unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) with the...

South Korea To Buy Global Hawk Mar 11, 2011 By Robert Wall, Amy Butler The U.S. and South Korea have reached a handshake agreement for the sale of the Global Hawk unmanned surveillance aircraft, according to program sources. The sale, which could take place as soon as this year, will include four of the high-flying UAVs. Though the Global Hawk is designed to carry a variety of payloads, including imagery sensors, radars and signals intelligence collectors, South Korea has been approved for the Block 30I version, which includes an electro-optical/infrared system. Seoul eventually would like a signals intelligence capability; but...

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan – An Iraqi al-Qaida operative was believed to be one of 15 militants killed in two U.S. missile strikes in Pakistan's tribal belt along the Afghan border Monday, Pakistani intelligence officials said. The officials said the man, identified as Abu Zaid al-Iraqi, handled the terrorist group's finances in Pakistan. He was not known to be on any published U.S. lists of wanted al-Qaida leaders, and U.S. officials do not normally acknowledge the existence of the CIA-led missile program or talk about who is being killed. The two strikes, coming roughly 24 hours apart, were the first...

The U.S. Navy is building on the successful first flight of the stealthy, tailless Northrop Grumman X-47B demonstrator as a pivotal step toward the long-held goal of marrying persistent, autonomous unmanned intelligence and strike aircraft with the reach of its fleet of aircraft carriers. “We’re celebrating the centennial of Naval aviation, and if we fast-forward 100 years, then we’ve added three words—unmanned, autonomous and LO [low-observable] relevant,” says Capt. Jaime Engdahl, the Navy’s Unmanned Combat Air System (UCAS) project director. The X-47B flight-test program, which began with a 29-min. flight at Edwards AFB, Calif., on Feb. 4 will answer questions...

Call it China’s ‘Christmas surprise.’ In a series of grainy photos given a pass by government Internet censors starting December 25, the People’s Liberation Army Air Force unveiled the country’s first stealth fighter prototype, the Chengdu J-20. For alarmists, the Pacific balance of power seemed to shift in an instant. Armed with hundreds of fast, elusive J-20s in coming years, the PLAAF could dominate the South China Sea, reaffirming China’s rise as a global power and elbowing aside less audacious, tech-savvy rivals. ‘(The) Asia-Pacific’s political landscape will be changed as China’s military capability can win over countries in this region,’...

A suspected U.S. drone apparently crashed in Yemen, was recovered by local police and then stolen by al Qaida, according to AFP. The plane was an MQ-1 Predator being used to support ongoing special operations missions against terrorists there. U.S. special ops troops have been in the country for quite some time, helping to train local security forces in fighting al Qaeda. Yes, drones crash quite frequently in combat zones for a variety of reasons. What’s interesting here is the Yemeni government’s inability to secure the wreckage, even when it can get its hands on it. The drone crashed in...

Northrop Grumman Corporation will field the first systems in the upgraded RC-12X Guardrail fleet, providing the U.S. Army with unparalleled signals intelligence (SIGINT) capability, under a recent task order awarded by the U.S. Army. This is a critical step toward making this mission-critical capability operational, scheduled for second quarter of this year. The RC-12X Guardrail is the Army's premier airborne SIGINT sensor and ground processing system, providing instantaneous precision geo-location and identification of threats to enable the Brigade Combat Team's Find, Fix, Finish, Exploit, Analyze and Disseminate (F3EAD) battle command process. The RC-12X Guardrail Modernization program extends the life of...

Newly-leaked diplomatic cables provide evidence that Boeing partnered with a Brazilian company to work on a previously undisclosed unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) project. The dispatch from the US embassy in Brasilia dated 15 January 2009 came during the most intense period in the competition for the F-X2 fighter contract, which involved the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet. On 13 January 2009, US Ambassador Clifford Sobel met with Nelson Jobim, then Brazil's minister of defence, to discuss Boeing's position in the competition, the cable says. The issue of technology transfer prompted Nelson to praise Boeing's work with an undisclosed Brazilian company.

Northrop Grumman’s X-47B unmanned combat air system (UCAS-D) demonstrator successfully completed its long-delayed first flight at Edwards AFB, Calif on Feb 4. The stealthy, single-engine UCAS took off early in the afternoon Pacific time and landed some 29 mins later, having achieved an altitude of 5,000-ft. Aimed at gathering air vehicle management system data, the first flight also marks the start of a roughly 50-flight, year-long Block 1 envelope expansion test campaign at Edwards AFB. Initial flight rate is expected to be once per week, rising to twice a week later in 2011. Northrop and U.S. Navy officials passed the...

The Defense Department has awarded $148.2 million to General Atomics Aeronautical Systems of Poway to provide 24 of its MQ-9 Reaper unmanned aerial vehicles to the U.S. Air Force. The delivery date was not announced. The Reaper, which was earlier known as Predator B, is a medium-to-high altitude UAV that is widely used for reconnaissance and surveillance. But it also can be outfitted with many types of weapons, including Hellfire air-to-ground missiles and the Paveway II, a laser-guided bomb. GAAS has more than 3,200 employees in San Diego County, more than half of whom work on UAV programs.

Though most experts hold a grim outlook for the Pentagon's budget, the unmanned aerial vehicle community remains in a positive mindset - at least about funding. Unmanned systems are competing well with other varied defence interests, says Dyke Weatherington, deputy director for the Pentagon's unmanned aircraft systems at the Association for Unmanned Vechicle Systems International's (AUVSI) 2011 Unmanned Systems Program Review 2 February in Washington DC. But UAVs face other challenges in securing their permanent position in defence arsenals, Weatherington and a panel on the future of unmanned air programmes say, particularly perception problems. As UAVs go up against large...

All of a sudden it was there, but then like any good stealth aircraft it vanished. Now the “Beast of Kandahar” has resurfaced in new photos, spurring aviation and defense wonks to once again speculate about the function and purpose of such a stealthy-looking unmanned aerial system. The Beast, also known as the Lockheed Martin RQ-170 Sentinel, first appeared in 2009 in the skies over Kandahar in Afghanistan. It was later revealed to be a product of Lockheed’s Skunk Works and property of the U.S. Air Force, but that’s about all that was revealed. What the RQ-170 is designed to...

The Air Force says three of the problems with its Gorgon Stare UAV camera system, according to DoDBuzz. Apparently, reports that the system suffered from numerous problems “was a draft memo that was later revised in January,” Buzz cites an Air Force spokesman as saying. The problems identified by Pentagon weapon testers are not likely to delay the fielding of the system, according to the service. Still, the project won’t be fielded until commanders downrange accept that it will work as promised: “The January memo includes three issues that we have identified and have fixes in place. The first was...

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan — A series of unmanned US drone strikes in a lawless district of Pakistan on Sunday killed at least 13 militants, officials said, as tribesmen took to the streets to protest the aerial campaign. The first two attacks took place in Datta Khel, some 40 kilometres (25 miles) west of North Waziristan's main town of Miranshah. The third was in Mando Khel, around 60 kilometres south of the town. In the first strike two missiles were fired on a vehicle seconds after it stopped outside a house in Datta Khel, officials said. "The US drone hit a car...

.K. military officials are preparing plans to bridge capability gaps that have emerged out of last year’s Strategic Defense and Security Review (SDSR) even as they brace for further cuts to plug remaining funding shortfalls. On the agenda for a Jan. 25 meeting are issues such as how to transition carrier strike capability in the absence of a fully operational aircraft carrier, and whether the planned Scavenger medium-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aircraft program can take on missions associated with the canceled Nimrod MRA4 maritime patrol aircraft and R1 Sentinel. The latter is due to be withdrawn from service once Afghanistan operations...

U.S. denies Turkey's request for combat UAVs ANKARA — The United States has banned a range of advanced weapons for export to Turkey. Officials said the administration of President Barack Obama has rejected a Turkish request for combat unmanned aerial vehicles as well as advanced munitions. They said the administration's decision came after consultations with Congress late last year. "There has been deep suspicion of Turkey in the United States, especially by Congress," an official said. So far, the Senate has blocked a Turkish request for the MQ-9 Reaper combat UAV by General Atomics. Ankara first relayed the Reaper request...

Pakistan negotiating drone deal with US From the Newspaper (14 hours ago) Today WASHINGTON: Pakistan is still negotiating a deal with the United States to acquire its own fleet of surveillance drones, and hopes to get six systems of the aircraft, diplomatic sources told Dawn. The drone system that the two countries are negotiating about is known as Shadow-200 and is currently used by the US Navy and the Marine Corps. It is launched from a trailer-mounted pneumatic catapult and is recovered with the aid of arresting gear similar to jets on an aircraft carrier. It is equipped with an...

The U.S. Army is now receiving UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicle) similar to those used by the air force, but flown under different conditions, by a quite different type of crew. While air force Predators and Reapers are flown by officers, assisted by sergeants operating sensors, the army operators are mostly sergeants, with some warrant officers. The air force operators control their UAVs via satellite link from a base in the United States. Only the ground crews go overseas. But army operators and ground crews not only go overseas, but are assigned to a specific brigade, which they are a part...

Tracking pirates in the Gulf of Aden, detecting bush fires in Australia, and improving battlefield communications and surveillance in Afghanistan are all potential uses for the solar powered unmanned aircraft, Zephyr, which has now officially been awarded three World Records - including one for the longest flight ever by an aeroplane - two weeks - and one for altitude higher than any current surveillance aeroplane in its class. These records were achieved on the first flight of the all-new Zephyr aircraft. Experts at QinetiQ say that because of Zephyr's unique ability to fly higher and longer than any other current...

A glimpse inside Boeing's Phantom Eye hydrogen-fueled unmanned aircraft has been provided by the Phantom Works' Keith Monteith, in a presentation to September's High Altitude and Near Space conference. The company-funded high-altitude long-endurance (HALE) demonstrator is planned to fly next year. The design is dominated by two things: the slender 150ft-span wing and the two 8ft-diameter liquid-hydrogen tanks that result in a bulbous fuselage. Both are driven by the requirement to demonstrate an endurance of at least four days above 60,000ft, to prove the technical readiness of hydrogen propulsion.