Swedish Space Corporation (SSC) has run a two-week flight trial using an EADS Eagle unmanned air vehicle (UAV) to demonstrate the use of such UAVs in Sweden.
SSC has a contract from FMV, the Swedish defence materiel administration, worth around SKr15 million ($1.5 million), to test the 17m (56ft)-span Eagle for the Swedish armed forces and Swedish national space board. Eagle is a derivative of the Israel Aircraft Industries Heron medium-altitude, long-endurance UAV.
During the trials the UAV carried atmospheric research instruments for Stockholm University's meteorology department, electro-optical/infrared sensors and a synthetic aperture radar reconnaissance and surveillance sensor for the armed forces, and a new type of transponder for the Swedish civil aviation administration.
The tests took place at the FMV/SSC North European Aerospace Test range which combines resources at the former's Vidsel range and the SSC's Esrange range, both in northern Sweden.
Stefan Tenor, FMVUAV product manager, says the evaluation will be continued this year with a decision due late next year "as to what type of UAVs the armed forces want".
Tenor says that in the original project, launched in mid-2000, testing was to be 50:50 military/scientific, "but the military portion now accounts for 90% of the testing".
Tenor says a technical check flight took place on 30 May and was followed by four military flights and one scientific flight. He says FMV was not testing the sensors, but gathering UAV operating experience and analysing its suitability as a military and scientific platform.
Sweden also considered General Atomics's Altus and Predator, and Elbit's Hermes 450 and 1500, before settling in the Eagle, "as it fulfilled our requirements to the lowest cost".
Source: Flight International
