Friday, September 16, 2016

A Solar Powered Surveillance Drone That Can Conduct Surveillance Missions For 45 Days

Zephyr drone. Ars Technica

FOX News: 'Star Trek'-style surveillance drone for the US military

It looks like a Star Trek Bird of Prey, and acts like a drone that terrorists cannot escape: A new military aircraft that’s powered by the sun and can conduct missions without landing for 45 days.

Airbus Defence and Space calls the new drone the High Altitude Pseudo Satellite (HAPS), but it’s been dubbed the Zephyr. What’s a “pseudo satellite”? It has satellite-type capabilities like extreme surveillance— but is on demand with the flexibility and versatility of an unmanned aircraft.

Unlike a satellite, the Zephyr can be landed, modified with alternative tech, and quickly re-launched to provide different capabilities as required.

Read more ....

WNU Editor: Impressive tech.

3 comments:

SCOTTYD said...

This looks identical to Facebook's drone. The one apparently beaming Internet to countries without. Who's tech is it?

SCOTTYD said...

This looks identical to Facebook's drone. The one apparently beaming Internet to countries without. Who's tech is it?

Hope for the West said...

It's made by airbus. The best info I have found is here from them:
https://airbusdefenceandspace.com/our-portfolio/military-aircraft/uav/zephyr/

Obviously companies glam up their products in videos/advertisements but it's still informative.