WATCHKEEPER UAV Undertakes Maiden Flight

(May 6, 2008) -- Thales UK today announces the successful first flight of the WATCHKEEPER unmanned air vehicle (UAV) platform. The WATCHKEEPER UAV, flown for the first time on 16 April from Megido airfield in northern Israel, is the first produced air vehicle, designed and built to meet the demanding requirements of the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD).

WATCHKEEPER will provide the UK armed forces with an essential intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance (ISTAR) capability, and will be a key component of the UK's network enabled capability (NEC). Thales UK, as Prime Contractor for the WATCHKEEPER programme, will deliver equipment, training and facilities, with the capability coming into service from 2010.

Commenting on this major programme milestone, Richard Deakin, Managing Director of Thales' aerospace business in the UK, says: "Thales UK's WATCHKEEPER programme is on track and has been steadily moving forward since June 2007 when the company unveiled its final configuration following a Critical Design Review undertaken by the MoD. We have made tremendous progress since the contract was signed in 2005 and all the customer-agreed programme milestones have so far been met on or ahead of schedule."

Looking forward to the plans for the rest of the year he adds: "2008 is an important year for the programme as it will also see the testing and integration of the automatic take-off and landing (ATOL) system, the I-Master radar and EO/IR/LTD payloads*. The I-Master radar flight trials have been extremely encouraging. The SAR imagery seen in the initial trials is outstanding and testing the GMTI functionality has just commenced. The combination of these sensors operating in a networked manner will certainly provide a transformational step in ISTAR capability for the UK armed forces."

Source : Thales UK