DailyDirt: Weapons In The Sky
from the urls-we-dig-up dept
Completely autonomous drones that can decide who or what to strike are still many years away from becoming a reality, but the military has already developed various unmanned aircraft that it’s been using primarily for gathering intelligence (rather than for attacking targets). Here are a few more examples of some of the high-tech flying weapons that exist today.
- The $1.8 billion prototype Unmanned Combat Air System demonstrator was recently launched into the air from a catapult. This marked the first-ever catapult launch of a drone from the flight deck of an aircraft carrier. [url]
- The Lockheed Martin F-22 Raptor, the most advanced stealth fighter jet in history, seems to have a problem with suffocating its pilots during normal flight. Since 2008, pilots would frequently and inexplicably suffer from what appeared to hypoxia — in one case, a pilot hit a tree while landing and didn’t even realize it. The cause of the problem was only recently identified as being due to a faulty valve on the pilots’ life-support vest. You’d think that after spending almost $80 billion on these planes, it wouldn’t have taken them almost five years to figure this out. [url]
- After 16 years and billions of dollars, the “Airborne Laser” project — a 747 jumbo-jet equipped with a powerful laser that can shoot missiles out of the sky — has finally been scrapped. Cost prohibitive and impractical, the Airborne Laser would likely have cost $92,000/hour to fly if it had worked. [url]
If you’d like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.
Filed Under: autonomous, aviation, drones, f-22, lasers, pilots, planes, prototype aircraft, weapons
Comments on “DailyDirt: Weapons In The Sky”
France..
The French are going to buy drones from the US or Israel to “modernize” their airborne capabilities….
There must be other countries making drones now….
Out of Sight, Out of Mind
Interactive Pakistan Murders Using Drones: http://drones.pitchinteractive.com/
F-22
The reason it takes 5 years to figure out is that the issue was the life support vest itself and not the aircraft. Does the life support vest being used support the turn on a at dime Mach speed handling the F22 is capable of?
Pfft. $92,000 is what, three toilet seats?
Re: Re:
How about the cost of the vats full of chemicals used to create the laser…all 500 gallons of it…
Re: Re:
According to federal agencies that track such things, it is about 1/2 the cost per hour associated with AF One, POTUS’ puddle-jumper.
Why put a laser on a 747 when we have so many perfectly good sharks?
Actually...
The US Navy’s UCAS X-47D also successfully accomplished a touch-and-go on the USS George H. W. Bush . I have no word on whether it did the T&G on its own or used the carriers built-in ACLS (Automated Carrier Landing System. [ACLS automagically lands the plane but pilots, being control freaks, loathe it.] Standing-room only, aircraft on deck, both of which were surprising. Usually we don’t allow audiences, then again, seems like it’s doing extremely well.
Re: Actually...
X-47 only has its own control, as directed by an operator. Landings (and T&G’s) are completely automatic, controlled by the onboard computer.
I can also understand why Naval Aviators are hesitant to use the automated system. I personally think that the one who tested the auto-landing system for the UCAS-D has balls of steel to ride an F-18 onto the deck with his hands off the stick.