A target drone is an unmanned aerial vehicle, generally remote controlled, usually used in the training of anti-aircraft crews.[1]
One of the earliest drones was the British DH.82 Queen Bee, a variant of the Tiger Moth trainer aircraft operational from 1935. Its name led to the present term "drone".[citation needed]
In their simplest form, target drones often resemble radio-controlled model aircraft. More modern drones may use countermeasures, radar, and similar systems to mimic manned aircraft.[2]
More advanced drones are made from large, older missiles which have had their warheads removed.[citation needed]
In the United Kingdom, obsolete Royal Air Force and Royal Navy jet and propeller-powered aircraft (such as the Fairey Firefly, Gloster Meteor and de Havilland Sea Vixen used at RAE Llanbedr between the 1950s and 1990s) have also been modified into remote-controlled drones, but such modifications are costly. With a much larger budget, the U.S. military has been more likely to convert retired aircraft or older versions of still serving aircraft (e.g., QF-4 Phantom II and QF-16 Fighting Falcon) into remotely piloted targets for US Air Force, US Navy and US Marine Corps use as Full-Scale Aerial Targets.[3][4]
List of target drones
edit
Purpose built
edit- Aerial Target
- Airspeed Queen Wasp
- de Havilland Queen Bee
- DRDO Abhyas
- DRDO Fluffy
- DRDO Lakshya
- DRDO Ulka
- Denel Dynamics Skua
- Meggitt Banshee[5]
- Aisheng Drone-2
- GAF Jindivik
- GAF Turana
- Mirach 100/5
- MQM-170
- TAI Şimşek
- Lockheed AQM-60 Kingfisher
- BQM-34 Firebee
- BQM-74 Chukar
- BQM-167 Skeeter
- Kratos BQM-177
- Nord CT41
- Karrar (UCAV)
- NCSIST Spark
Conversions
edit- Curtiss Queen Seamew
- Douglas BT-2BR and BT-2BG
- de Havilland Vampire
- Fairey Queen
- Firefly U.Mk 8 and U.Mk 9
- Meteor U.15, 16, and 21
- MiG-15V
- Mil Mi-4UM
- Miles Queen Martinet
- F4U-4K Corsair
- F6F-5K Hellcat
- Ilyushin Il-28M
- PQ-8 Cadet
- PQ-13 Ercoupe
- PQ-14 Cadet
- QAH-1S Cobra
- QP-4B Privateer
- QB-17 Flying Fortress
- QT-33 Shooting Star
- QB-47 Stratojet
- QF-80 Shooting Star
- QF-86 Sabre
- QF-100 Super Sabre
- QF-102 and PQM-102 Delta Dagger
- QF-104 and UF-104J Starfighter
- QF-106 Delta Dart
- QF-4 Phantom II
- QF-16 Fighting Falcon
- QF-9 Cougar
References
edit- ^ "Avonds Scale Jets - Target Drones". Avonds.com. Retrieved 2011-10-22.
- ^ "Target Drones". Vector Site. Retrieved 2011-10-22.
- ^ "QF-4 Target Drone". learndrone.tech. Archived from the original on 2020-01-30. Retrieved 2020-01-30.
- ^ "F-16 Versions - QF-16". www.f-16.net.
- ^ "meggittdefense.com". www.meggittdefense.com.