On March 20, 2014, Dassault Aviation organized a formation flight of the nEUROn unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) with a Rafale fighter and a Falcon 7X business jet. This was the first time in the world that a combat UAS flew in formation with other aircraft. The entire operation lasted 1 hour and 50 minutes and took the patrol out over the Mediterranean to a range of several hundred kilometers. Continue reading
Turkey’s Anka to Get New Engine
Turkish national engine specialist Tusas Turkish Engine Industries (TEI), which agreed to produce prototype engines for the country’s first indigenous UAS, has entered a partnership with GE Aviation and now anticipates export sales. Continue reading
Greece Issues RFP for UAS for Immigration Control
The Greek government in a pilot project is expected to use UAS in order to be able to oversee the country’s sea border in the Aegean sea — which is considered one of the main avenues for immigration into Europe. Greece’ s Ministry of Marine and Aegean Sea has already issued a competition call for a UAS which will be handed to the Greek authorities by the end of June. Continue reading
X-47B Completes Night Flights
The unmanned X-47B conducts its first night flight April 10 over Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Md. Night flights are the next incremental step in developing the operations concept for more routine UAS flight activity. Continue reading
South Korea Considers Low-Altitude Radars from Israel
South Korea is revving up efforts to address vulnerabilities in its air defences, which were brought to the fore following the recent discovery of three crashed UAS, presumably from North Korea. Seoul authorities are seeking to introduce 10 Israeli-made RPS-42 low-altitude radars. Continue reading
South Korea has New Evidence UAS Came from North
South Korea said on Friday that it found additional evidence pointing to North Korea as the sender of unmanned surveillance aircraft found in recent weeks near the inter-Korean border. Continue reading
UAS Survey Looted Dead Sea Sites in Jordan
A video camera strapped to the nose of an unmanned aircraft first shows only a spinning, sunlit horizon in the barrens of southern Jordan. Then the camera swoops, low and slow, over a hilltop whose surface recalls photographs of the lunar battlefields of World War I Europe. Crater after crater gouge the hill’s stony surface. It looks like the aftermath of a murderous artillery barrage. Continue reading
K-State Salina Programme to Validate ASTM Standards
Kansas State University Salina is one of the first universities in the United States to offer a bachelor of science degree in unmanned aircraft systems. Now, K-State Salina has begun a programme to validate standards developed by ASTM International Committee F38 on Unmanned Aircraft Systems. Continue reading