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| Israel-Palestine |
| IDF unveils new miniature surveillance planes |
| 2004-03-26 |
| Found via Drudge. Completing the trifica of robot posts... The Israel Defense Forces is equipping its forces with a new range of spy drones small enough to fit in a soldier’s backpack, including one that weighs less than a can of soda, the army said Thursday. The Israel Air Force has frequently used larger unmanned spy planes to track and target Palestinian militants during airstrikes. The new mini-drones would also give army forces in the field on-the-spot access to aerial intelligence. The small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV’s) and the futuristic looking micro UAV’s were displayed Thursday at a conference held by the army’s Ground Force Command on low intensity conflicts. The new baby drones have already been supplied to some ground units. The portable planes give the units almost immediate access to aerial photographs "when the need arises," a military official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "We use them to take aerial photographs of the (Palestinian) territories," he said. On display Thursday were the BIRDY and the Spy There mini-drone,s produced by Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI). BIRDY - with a weight of 1.3 kilograms (3 pounds) - can be carried and launched by a single soldier, who guides the drone by clicking on coordinates on a laptop computer. It has a five-kilometer (three-mile) range, IAI said.IAI also displayed two prototype micro-drones, the Mosquito and the Mosquito 1.5. These tiny spy gadgets weigh a mere 250 grams (9 ounces) and 500 grams (18 ounces) each. The Mosquito, equipped with a miniature video camera, has already completed several successful 40-minute trial flights, IAI said. Cool! The army currently rents the drones from IAI but has issued a contact offer to supply them with the small UAV’s, the official said. I wonder if they would be willing to rent some to the U.S for our southern border..... |
| Posted by:CrazyFool |
| #3 Any Old Crows around here will remember those Bekah Valley drone deployments in the early 1980s. During that time I crashed a few Mirassou library tastings with Messieurs Addington and Campbell in attendance. Trust me, way back then America already had the ability to alias inbound aircraft return signatures so that they resembled patchy fog or a flock of birds. Even early stealth fighters had the radar cross-section of a BB Israeli RPV (Remote Piloted Vehicle) preflight sorties up the Bekah back-fed nearly realtime telemetered recon of source guided lock-on frequencies, tracking system light-ups, target painting wattage and vital jamming bandwidths. Even today, few low-grade militaries can afford the agile frequency-hopping VCOs (Voltage Controlled Oscillators) needed to outwit advanced targeting systems. Israel's new generation of miniature drones benefit substantially from Sony Walkman era rare earth magnets and selectively plated printed motor windings. Compact multiaxis laser gyros are a bit of help as well. But these mini-drones are merely Hollywood style flying minicam platforms that have been repackaged into small form factor composite material micro-aircraft. The most significant evolution of all is occurring in the area of hovering reconnaissance. Third generation miniature drone technology is a modern day equivalent of early mosaic array stare-down satellite technology at a mere fraction of their original cost. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2004-04-05 9:40:59 AM |
| #2 [Off-topic or abusive comments deleted] |
| Posted by: Anonymous TROLL 2004-03-26 8:24:18 PM |
| #1 Actually, the American Border Patrol, a private group, has built and deployed three UAVs so far, and they're proving effective in identifying unlawful border crossers. The big problem is getting Border Patrol agents to do something about it. Now if we could get about 5000 former Marines and Army types organized into a "Retired Militia", sanctioned by the US government, and give them a bounty of say, $25 a head for all they catch and detain, maybe we could STOP the stupidity on our southern border. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2004-03-26 6:03:09 PM |