Image Source: topwar.ru
At a recent technological exercise of the US Air Force in the Mojave Desert (Edwards Base, California), a compact drone that reproduces the flight of a bird by flapping its wings managed to remain unnoticed by detection systems.
Ornadyne's compact ornithopter O1 does not use propellers like most drones. Instead, it mimics the mechanics of bird flight, staying in the air thanks to flapping semi-rigid wings. The small device, weighing about 450 grams, looks like a crow or a kestrel (with a wingspan of about 1 meter) and is designed to collect intelligence data or monitor terrain at low altitudes. He can stay in the air for more than an hour and fly up to 10 kilometers while carrying a small camera.
Ornadyne startup co-founder Armen Arakelyan in a press release from the Ministry of Defense:
The tests were held as part of the "Game of Drones" event. According to the co-founder and CEO of the company, Georg Kividjian (judging by the names in the management of the American startup, guys with Armenian roots), sensors of competing UAV counteraction systems registered the device as a bird, not as a drone. The company notes that the appearance of the O1 can be adapted to local bird species by changing the color, proportions and silhouette.
You don't need a platform to launch a drone - it's hand-held. In this case, the control is carried out via a tablet.
Image source: topwar.ru
This approach allows the drone to operate at low altitudes with minimal acoustic and visual visibility, which is especially important for reconnaissance operations.
