TAI's "Anka" MALE
Turkey’s first locally developed Medium-Altitude, Long-Endurance (MALE) UAS, the TAI ‘Anka’, first unveiled in July 2010, made its first test flight at the end of the year.
TAI’s “Anka” MALE First Test Flight
UVS International Appoints New Board Members
Yesterday, 12 January 2011, the UVS International General Assembly, which was held in Paris, France, unanimously voted 2 new members and 2 new observers onto its Board of Directors:
Gilles Fartek , Integra, Denmark (formerly an observer, now a full member) Claus Frey , EADS Deutschland, Cassidian, Germany (observer) Abdoulaye N’Diaye , Thales Avionics, France (formerly an observer, now a full member) George Papageorgiou , Honeywell Aerospace, France (observer)Global Observer Test Flight at Edwards Air Force Base
An experimental UAS with a wingspan almost the size of a Boeing 747 took to the skies over the Mojave Desert last week in a test flight from Edwards Air Force Base, reports the LA Times. On Thursday, the Global Observer performed its first test demonstrating its ability to use liquid hydrogen as fuel. It circled above Edwards at about 3,000 feet above ground level in a four-hour test, according to AeroVironment executives.
UAS Civil Airspace Integration Webinar
Avionics Magazine is hosting a Webinar entitled: UAS Civil Airspace Integration: Progress and Challenges on Wednesday, Feb. 23, 2011, from Noon to 1 p.m. ET. Continue reading
New President for Unmanned Systems, VT Group
The VT Group has announced that Daniel Bertram has joined the organization as president of the Unmanned Systems line of business and member of the Senior Leadership Team. In this role, he will have responsibility for the vertical and horizontal expansion of the group’s US services offering worldwide. Continue reading
Hybrid Energy Storage System for UAS
A paper proposing a hybrid energy storage system to solve the energy issues of long endurance UAS, presented at the IECON 2010 – the 36th Annual Conference on IEEE Industrial Electronics Society, has just been published at the IEEE Digital Library. It is available online to members and subscribers.
MLB to Supply 5 UAS for US Fire Control
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Building and Fire Research Laboratory Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) Program, in Gaithersburg, MD, has just awarded a contract worth $927,500 to the MLB Company of Mountain View, California for five Unmanned Aerial Systems to collect data characterizing the location of a fire perimeter spreading through wild lands, fuels and atmospheric conditions. Continue reading
FAA Grants COAs to El Dorado, Kansas
The El Dorado Times in Kansas reports that the FAA has granted two Certificates of Authorization (COA) to the City of El Dorado to fly Unmanned Aircraft at El Dorado Municipal Captain Jack Thomas Memorial Airport for the next 12 months. The COAs are renewable and are granted by the FAA to public entities desiring Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) operations and allows the entity to use defined airspace for specified times and include special provisions unique to each operation.
The City of El Dorado applied for the COAs earlier this year after signing an agreement with Flint Hills Solutions (FHS), a local UAS solutions provider. The agreement includes the delegation to FHS by El Dorado to be the COA technical application administrator as well as the UAS designated operator for the City at El Dorado Airport.