Ukrainian-based aerospace company Skyeton announced that Raybird 3 tactical unmanned aircraft system has successfully achieved fully autonomous takeoff from a moving car.
“We have successfully tested a new car launch system,” the company said on Facebook adding that “It is designed for flights in areas located at altitudes of 1000 m above sea level and above.”
Skyeton also released a short video of trials.
The moving platform trials pave the way for using this new tactical unmanned aircraft system in new regions without the use of expensive airfields and massive catapults. In fact, any stretch of road can use as an impromptu runway for a Raybird 3 drone.
The Raybird 3 is a family of small unmanned aerial systems designed for different long-range missions, ISTAR solutions, and commercial applications.
According to the CEO of the company Alex Stepura, this is an unmanned aerial system, designed to patrol vast territories, like thousands sq km and more with an endurance of round-a clock flight.
“RB3 belongs to small class – means the weight of the flying vehicle is always less than 25 kg,” Alex Stepura said previously in an interview.
“In this class, our system is lightest among our direct competitors ( INSITU, UAV factory, Bluebird, Tekever) – the whole system with 3 aerial vehicles, catapult, two ground control stations, antennas, etc, being packed in boxes weighs less than 200 kg. For example, INSITU’s catapult weighs 2 tons,” Stepura told Defence Blog in an interview.
As noted by the company, the unique mobility of the system allows for quick SUV transportation and deployment in minutes. The modular UAV design makes exchanging of various function modules easy. Payload packages can include radio relays and electric warfare/countermeasure equipment.