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- An unmanned combat aerial vehicle (UCAV), also known as a combat drone, fighter drone or battlefield UAV, is an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that is used for intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance and carries aircraft ordnance such as missiles, anti-tank guided missiles (ATGMs), and/or bombs in hardpoints for drone strikes. These drones are usually under real-time human control, with varying levels of autonomy.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unmanned_combat_aerial_vehicle
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Feb 4, 2022 · The drones' symbolic status only grew when Predator - originally conceived for aerial reconnaissance - was armed with Hellfire missiles. Getty Images. General Qasem Soleimani was killed by a...
Some reconnaissance drones that have armed capability include the CASC CH-92, IAI Eitan and the Ababil-3, Ababil-5, Hamaseh. Some commercial drones such as DJI Mavic and Phantom have been modified to carry light explosives for combat missions in recent wars.
Drone strikes were also used to destroy military supplies. Drone footage released by the Islamic State showed bombs being dropped on an ammunitions facility located in Deir ez-Zor, Syria, an area of contested control between the Islamic State and the Syrian government at the time. [31]
Feb 4, 2022 · The drones' symbolic status only grew when Predator - originally conceived for aerial reconnaissance - was armed with Hellfire missiles.
- 4 min
- Overview
- Taken into battle in a backpack
DUGWAY PROVING GROUND, Utah — The killer drone whooshed out of its launch tube, spreading its carbon wings and shooting into the sky.
Flying too fast for the naked eye to track, the battery-powered robot circled the Utah desert, hunting for the target it had been programmed to strike. Moments later, it sailed through the driver’s side window of an empty pickup truck and exploded in a fireball.
“Good hit,” exclaimed an operator from AeroVironment, the company that produces the drone and sells it to the U.S. military.
NBC News traveled to a military testing center for exclusive access to the first public demonstration of the Switchblade 300, a small, low-cost “kamikaze” drone made by AeroVironment, which sources said the U.S. military has used quietly for years in targeted killing operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria.
The demonstration told a story of promise and peril.
Americans have become accustomed to images of Hellfire missiles raining down from Predator and Reaper drones to hit terrorist targets in Pakistan or Yemen. But that was yesterday’s drone war.
Weighing just 5½ pounds, including its small warhead, the Switchblade can be taken into battle in a backpack and fly up to 7 miles to hit a target. The 300 model is designed to kill individuals, while a larger version, the 600, can destroy armored vehicles. AeroVironment isn’t yet allowed to show the bigger one to the public.
They are called “Switchblade” because their bladelike wings spring out on launch.
“It allows our warfighter to have a battlefield superiority, which our enemies can't see, can't hear, can't tell it's coming, and really precisely achieve a specific mission effect,” said Wahid Nawabi, AeroVironment’s Afghan-born CEO.
Nawabi said he has been told that the Taliban and others who have been on the receiving end refer to it as an angry bird or a buzzing bee.
Public procurement data show that the Switchblade 300 costs a small fraction of a Hellfire missile’s price tag, let alone the total cost of keeping Reaper drones in the air, flown by pilots in Nevada.
The Switchblade has a feature that allows the operator to adjust the blast radius, so it can kill the driver of a vehicle but not a passenger, for example. The weapon can be “waved off” up to two seconds before impact, AeroVironment says, in the event of a mistake or a risk to civilians.
- 2 min
- Ken Dilanian
Nov 17, 2021 · They looked back at the origin of drones and when they became a weapon of war. RUND ABDELFATAH, BYLINE: The first drone prototype was created in 1917. It was called the Kettering Bug.
Sep 7, 2021 · In October 2001, nearly one month after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center, a US Air Force pilot made history as the first person to conduct a lethal strike with a modern drone...
