Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) plans to demonstrate two of its UASs to the Army and Marine Corps next year, a company official said.
IAI displayed the two systems at the Association of the United States Army exposition in Washington this week. Panther is a tilt-rotor unmanned aerial vehicle designed for vertical take-off and-landing for tactical missions, said Shmuel Yachin, ISI’s chief coordinator for ground systems.
Panther carries cameras for day-and-night surveillance as well as a laser that can paint potential targets for a strike, Yachin said.
Yachin said ISI is looking to demontrate Panther to the Army and Marine Corps sometime between April and June 2012, along with its Electric Tethered Observation Platform (ETOP).
ETOP is essentially a hovercraft tied to the ground, which can climb to 100 metres and relay images to ground forces. Equipped with the same payload as Panther, it also deploys a laser to paint targets, Yachin said.
ETOP can be connected to a generator and can stay aloft indefinitely, Yachin said.