Skydweller Uncrewed Solar-Powered MAPS aircraft | Photo: Skydweller Aero Inc.
Thales has announced it will be equipping the Skydweller solar drone with its AirMaster S artificial intelligence (AI) equipped radar.
The Skydweller is a solar-powered, carbon-fibre, autonomous, Medium-Altitude Pseudo-Satellite (MAPS) aircraft with the wingspan of a Boeing 747 airliner, payload capacity of 400 kilograms and an endurance that could extend to months, allowing virtually perpetual surveillance, with no carbon emissions.
The Thales AirMaster S radar system features ‘SMART RADAR capabilities’ that operate in X-band with AESA (Active Electronically Scanned Array Antenna) technology that offers ‘immediate and accurate assessment of land, air or sea situation,’ with ‘auto-tuning capabilities based on flight and mission conditions, perfectly suited to the Skydweller drone’s persistence in flight.’ Thales said the radar has an AI-based target classification feature that can ‘detect points of interest among a large volume of data and reduce the amount of information that needs to be transmitted to the ground.’
Chief Commercial Officer for Europe Middle East & Africa at Skydweller, Sébastien Renouard, said in a statement, “The combination of Thales’ AirMaster S Smart radar with the MAPS Skydweller will make it possible to change the paradigm for surveillance missions, by offering a unique solution to current sovereignty challenges.”
Executive Vice President of Defense Mission Systems at Thales, Philippe Duhamel, called the collaboration ‘a real technological breakthrough for surveillance missions.’
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