Zitat:French drone manufacturer Parrot announced that it will supply 300 ANAFI Unmanned Aerial Systems for the French Army under a five-year contract.

As noted by the company, Parrot was chosen by the French Defense Procurement Agency, DGA, to supply its ANAFI micro-drones to equip the French Armies.

The selected ANAFI micro-drone is specially adapted for worldwide forces, offers soldiers a micro-drone of 500 grams with day and night observation capabilities. With a flight time of 32 minutes, it has the best performance in its category. The 5-year contract covers several hundred drones, the development of adaptations and the maintenance of equipment and software. The first systems will be delivered in the upcoming months.

ANAFI drone extends the reconnaissance capabilities of the French forces. Thanks to its powerful 32x zoom, articulated around two 4K 21-megapixel cameras, the detection of person-sized targets is possible up to 2km away with a detailed accuracy of 13cm. The zoom images are merged with those obtained by the FLIR Boson thermal imaging camera; the latter allows the detection of hot spots by day and by night. Deployable in 55 seconds, it is also very discreet: with a sound signature of 79 dB at a distance of 1m, it is inaudible from 130m.

Zitat:China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, a leading defense contractor, conducted the maiden test flight of what it called one of the country's best unmanned strike aircraft earlier this week.

The nation's largest missile-maker CASIC said in a statement that the WJ-700 combat/reconnaissance drone made its debut flight on Monday at an unidentified airport in Northeast China. The maiden flight verified the plane's overall design and its subsystems' compatibility.

Next, the drone will carry out more test flights to examine its flight, reconnaissance and combat capabilities, it said, noting the product will be available to both domestic and foreign buyers once it enters the market.

The State-owned conglomerate called the WJ-700 "the first and only high-altitude, high-speed, long-endurance combat/reconnaissance drone in China", adding that there is a very small group of similar products in the international market.

(15.01.2021, 22:01)Quintus Fabius schrieb: So richtig interessant wird dass, wenn China anfängt Drohnen im großen Stil günstig an unsere Gegner zu verhökern.

Zitat:General Atomics recently announced that it had successfully flight-tested a dispenser pod as part of a broader demonstration of anti-submarine warfare capabilities it is developing for its MQ-9B SeaGuardian drone. In this particular test, the pods were used to release sonobuoys, but the company has said that they will also be able to launch precision-guided munitions, as well as small unmanned aircraft, the latter of which could then potentially operate as an autonomous swarm.

The anti-submarine warfare test took place last November, with an MQ-9A carrying one of the 10-tube dispenser pods and other anti-submarine warfare (ASW) related systems as a surrogate for an MQ-9B SeaGuardian.

Zitat:While all of these ASW-related developments are significant, General Atomics has also outlined broader plans for the dispenser pods in the past. Last year, it released an infographic on various existing or in development payloads for the MQ-9 series, including the dispensers, which a Reaper can carry up to four of at once. It mentioned the plans for the November sonobuoy test, but also said that it could be configured to release precision-guided munitions or small drones.

Zitat:LongShot UAV Carrying Air-to-Air Weapons: DARPA Launches Design Phase


February 9, 2021Air, Military
LongShot UAV Carrying Air-to-Air Weapons: DARPA Launches Design Phase
By Inside Unmanned Systems

Artist’s conception of the Longshot, courtesy DARPA.

The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s (DARPA’s) LongShot program seeks to increase engagement range and effectiveness of air-to-air weaponry by developing an air-launched unmanned air vehicle (UAV) with the ability to deploy multiple such air-to-air weapons.

DARPA recently awarded contracts to General Atomics, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman for preliminary Phase I design work. The objective is to develop a novel UAV that can significantly extend engagement ranges, increase mission effectiveness, and reduce the risk to manned aircraft.

Current air superiority concepts rely on advanced manned fighter aircraft to provide a penetrating counter-air capability to effectively deliver weapons. It is envisioned that LongShot will increase the survivability of manned platforms by allowing them to be at standoff ranges far away from enemy threats, while an air-launched LongShot UAV efficiently closes the gap to take more effective missile shots.

“The LongShot program changes the paradigm of air combat operations by demonstrating an unmanned, air-launched vehicle capable of employing current and advanced air-to-air weapons,” said DARPA program manager Lt. Col. Paul Calhoun. “LongShot will disrupt traditional incremental weapon improvements by providing an alternative means of generating combat capability.”

In later phases of the program, LongShot will construct and fly a full-scale air-launched demonstration system capable of controlled flight, before, during, and after weapon ejection under operational conditions.

Zitat:DARPA Is Developing Aircraft-Launched Missile-Like Drones That Fire Their Own Air-To-Air Missiles

Zitat:DARPA to develop new combat drone with air-to-air capabilities[/b]

Zitat:A Group Of Israelis Secretly Built And Tested Suicide Drones For An Unknown Asian Customer

group of more than 20 Israelis, among them former defense officials, are under investigation for allegedly illegally designing, producing, and selling “armed loitering missiles,” also known as “suicide drones,” to an unnamed Asian country. The news comes less than two weeks after the announcement of three legitimate sales of these kinds of weapons by the Israeli arms industry, including to unnamed Asian countries.

Zitat:Georgia developing indigenous surveillance and strike UAS

Tbilisi-based aviation plant TbilAviaMsheni (TAM) is developing Georgia’s first surveillance and strike unmanned aircraft system (UAS), dubbed Project T-31, the company confirmed to Janes on 9 February.

A 25 January report showcased digital engineering sketches of the UAS three weeks after TAM’s Chairman, Vazha Tordia, told Georgia InterPressNews (IPN) that the TAM Management company, founded in 2015, was developing Georgia’s first UAS. [...] The cutaway illustration of the armed T-31 also showed a parabolic antenna installed in the payload bay located in the upper front section of the UAS, immediately ahead of wings and above the EO/IR payload. The company told Janes it is for line-of-sight transmission of images and data.

Zitat:The Polish Military Is Now Officially Armed With The Warmate Suicide Drone

Polish firm WB Electronics has been marketing the Warmate loitering munition outside of the country, as well, including with a glitzy sales video.

Zitat:Ukraine’s military export agency, Ukrspecexport, unveiled the Sokil-300 unmanned combat aerial vehicle at the biennial International Defence Exhibition and Conference (IDEX).

The Sokil-300 (Falcon-300) is a strike drone developed by the Kyiv-based LUCH Design Bureau. It is a surveillance and reconnaissance unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developing for the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

The Sokil-300 drone is armed with four guided missiles with a range of up to 10 km. It can carry a maximum payload of 300 kg, has a maximum takeoff load of 1,225 kg, and can attain a maximum speed of 335 km/h. The drone has a wingspan of 14m and a length of 8.57m.

Zitat:Russia Provides A Glimpse Of Its Orion Drone Executing Combat Trials In Syria
The Orion drone, now said to be in production for Russia, is seen releasing both apparent guided munitions and dumb bombs.

Russia has released a video showing, apparently for the first time, its Orion unmanned aerial vehicle during field trials in Syria, including dropping weapons. The footage seems to have originated from the drone’s combat evaluation that reportedly took place in 2018.

Zitat:he U.S. Navy recently conducted a demonstration in which a relatively small vertical takeoff and landing capable unmanned aircraft with autonomous capabilities delivered equipment to the supercarrier USS Gerald R. Ford. The service has been increasingly exploring novel means of resupplying surface warships and submarines that may be better suited to future distributed concepts of operation.

Zitat:General Atomics releases new image of its next-generation combat drone

General Atomics’ Aeronautical Systems division, or GS-ASI, has released a new rendering of its stealthy, next-generation unmanned aircraft system.

The GA-ASI released a new rendering of the new intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and strike unmanned air vehicle (UAV)’s design on its social media page on Friday.

The company Twitter post states: “Our robust digital engineering and advanced manufacturing practices deliver affordable dominant weapon systems to the warfighter with the speed and lethality required to maintain overmatch.”

According to open sources, the new flying-wing unmanned aircraft is designing as a proposed replacement of the U.S. Air Force’s MQ-9 Reaper remotely piloted aircraft.