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BREAKING: Discover How A Slacker Makes $100,000 A Year! |
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| Image: Courtesy of the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency | |
| BIRD OF PREY: The Vulture would weigh in at 1,000 pounds, have a wingspan as wide as 500 feet and be capable of staying in the air for five years without landing. |
The Vulture project, which stands for Very high altitude, Ultraendurance, Loitering Theater Unmanned Reconnaissance Element, seeks to deliver and maintain an aircraft that can remain above a surveillance target for at least five years. Weighing in at an anticipated 1,000 pounds, the vehicle is being designed to collect its power from its environment—via solar or some other source—to store and use energy efficiently, and include a robotic refueling capability. With a wingspan of between 300 and 500 feet, the Vulture would function like a low-orbit satellite as much as like an aircraft, staying aloft far longer than any surveillance plane can today, says Jamey Jacob, an Oklahoma State University associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, adding, “It would provide a persistent presence for the military.” Jacobs is working as a consultant to defense contractors developing designs for the aircraft.
The two biggest hurdles in developing the Vulture are choosing the best energy source to power the vehicle and well-constructed sturdy components that will last at least five years. One option is to make the aircraft modular, so that components can break off and fly home via remote control when necessary and new modules can be flown up and remotely attached. Another option is to use a second aircraft to refuel the Vulture and repair it while in flight.
Several improvements in technology over the past decade—including solar cells and more efficient engines—make these aircraft more of a reality than they have been in the past. “The aircraft have to be light and run extremely efficiently,” Jacob says. “You can’t run off of today’s fuels for five years. Ideally, the aircraft would have solar cells that can alternately charge and operate while in flight.”
The projects are complementary. “The Rapid Eye is for when you don’t know where you want to be but you need to get there quickly,” Pulliam says. “The Vulture is for when you want to be over an area for a long time.”
It’s unclear whether the Rapid Eye will be able to be retrieved after it is used; DARPA is leaving that question to the firms that submit designs for the plane. “We would prefer to be able to recover the aircraft,” Pulliam says, “but the cost of the aircraft will not be such that it must be recovered.”
U.K. defense firm QinetiQ claims to hold the record in keeping an unmanned aircraft aloft. In 2005 its Zephyr high-altitude, solar-powered vehicle stayed aloft continuously for 54 hours during a test flight. The previous unmanned endurance record was set in 2001 by a jet-powered U.S. Air Force Global Hawk surveillance aircraft, which flew for more than 30 hours. The Zephyr is a carbon-fiber aircraft weighing 66 pounds and with a wingspan of about 59 feet that by day flies on solar power generated by amorphous silicon arrays that cover its wings; it is powered at night by lithium-sulfur batteries recharged during the day using solar power.
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pingback:
Posted: Sep 18th, 2007 at 5:35 am |
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Pentagon Developing New Unmanned Spy Planes |
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ROBERT LOMADILLA
Posted: Jul 14th, 2009 at 1:07 pm |
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I JUST WANT TO KNOW WHY YOUR SPY PLANES WERE NAMED U2′S.HEHEHEHEHEH |

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