DailyTech has discussed unmanned military vehicles in great
detail over the past year. We covered everything from the iRobot PakBot
which can detect enemy gunfire to drones which can
loiter in the air for hours surveying the battlefield.
The official website for the Multi-National Force in Iraq is
reporting that a Hunter
MQ-5B/C unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) made its first kill on September 1. A
scout weapons team (SWT) was performing surveillance when two enemy combatants
were discovered.
The enemy combatants were suspected of planting improvised
explosive device (IEDs) on a roadway, so air support was requested by the SWT.
A Hunter UAV was sent to the location where it dropped a precision bomb on the
two suspects. Both were killed by the blast.
"It’s very humbling to know that we have set an Army
historical mark in having the first successful launch in combat from an Army
weaponized UAV," said Capt. Raymond Fields of the Unmanned Aerial
Surveillance Company. "This would not be possible without my Soldiers and
civilians working hard day in and day out in Iraq to accomplish this
feat."
"This accomplishment adds a precise and discriminate
means for our Army to successfully engage the enemy in counterinsurgency
warfare," remarked Col. A.T. Ball of the 25th Combat Aviation Brigade.
The MQ-5B/C is a fixed-wing, twin tail-boom aircraft which
is powered by two Northrop Grumman diesel engines. The aircraft can stay aloft
for 15 hours and climb to a maximum of 20,000 feet. The MQ-5B/C can carry up to
260 pounds of ammunition split between two external hard points.