Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Words Hard at Work on Robotic Drones
Here’s an insightful article from the Wall Street Journal about Lockheed Martin’s foray into the robot done market. Lockheed, which helped develop the Dragon Eye, and the Desert Hawk is trying to play catch-up to larger robotic drone makers, like Northrup Grumman and Boeing. There’re working on innovative ideas, like a plane that can be launced from a submarine.The Skunk Works has fresh Darpa backing for another curious drone, dubbed the Cormorant. It would be fired out of a submarine missile tube, unfurl itself and carry out surveillance or combat sorties over a range of about 500 miles.
Another plane, dubbed the "Falcon", would fly at speeds up to Mach 9 high up in the atmosphere, and act as a bomber. The aircraft pictured has a moveable wing surface which allows it to go from a slow glide into a fast dive-bomb. Since the US Military has proposed increasing spending on unmanned aircraft to 1.9 billions dollars in 2007, there’s lots of contracts to be had and money to be made.
Tags: [ Robots | Lockheed Martin | Drone | Military]
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June 9th, 2008 at 9:16 pm
As much as I appreciate this military technology…it makes me sick. When our “best-and-brightest” engineers are given a choice to either lose their jobs to “outsourcing” OR they are invited to work for a large, Military/Industrial Complex (MIC) such as Lockheed, what choice do they have? Instead of working to better human-kind, the tax-payer is bled dry by our government in order to fund these destructive projects that serve no other perpose than to maim, kill, slaughter, and mutilate innocent (or, in military terms, “collatoral damage”) human lives.
Lost Boy
August 13th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Wayne,
That’s bullshit about these weapons being made to “mail, kill, slaughter, and mutilate innocent human lives.” You have a very idealized view of the world in which you think you and your family will never be threatened by the lethal force of the very enemy weapons like these are designed to fight.