Page 25 - Australian Defence Magazine April 2019
P. 25

AIRBUS
Zephyr to break more records
Anticipated military and civilian roles include intelligence, surveillance and re- connaissance; maritime surveillance; and communications relay not just for military purposes but also for regions in Africa and South America with poor connectivity.
The UK Ministry of Defence has ac- quired three of the type but when they will be delivered and where they will be based has not been disclosed.
Meanwhile BAE Systems disclosed at Avalon that construction of its first full- scale PHASA (Persistent High Altitude So- lar Aircraft) 35 solar-powered high altitude long-endurance UAV would be completed in October, with flight trials to follow.
The initial focus of the company-funded project is on military applications.
The PHASA 35 has a wingspan of 35 me- tres but weighs only 150kg. The company said the aircraft would be able to remain aloft for up to a year with a 15kg payload. Location of the forthcoming flight trials had still to be decided, but the requirement for largely un- restricted airspace and reliable weather must make Australia a strong contender.
JULIAN KERR | AVALON
AUSTRALIA will be the base for Airbus Defence and Space’s Zephyr ‘pseudo-satel- lite’ to seek a new world endurance record later this year, aiming to stay aloft for 100 days without refuelling.
The previous record of 25 days 23 hours was logged by a Zephyr S over Arizona in August 2018.
Nigel Chandler, head of Zephyr sales, said the record-seeking flight would be op-
erated from the Zephyr’s primary flight test centre at Wyndham, WA.
Running exclusively on solar power and weighing only 75 kg despite its 25 metre wingspan, the Zephyr is designed to operate at an altitude of up to 75,000 ft, above the weather and other air traf- fic, maintaining its position over a geo- graphic location.
A number of Zephyrs are based at Wyn- dham and Chandler said the primary fo- cus of the current program was on shorter flights carrying payloads of up to 5 kg.
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