Russian's Irkut Corporation announced today that it is to begin production of five 'unmanned and optionally piloted' 'civilian' UAV systems in early 2006. They are the Irkut-2F/T, -20, -60, -200 and -850. The latter model can lift a payload of up to 850 kg up to 200km.
All are single piston-engined, fixed-wing flying between 100-150km at altitudes of between 100-500m for the lightweight types and up to 3,500m for the Irkut-200. A suite of cameras and sensors are said to have been developed to go with the Irkut fleet.
Dr Vladimir Sautov, vice-president for marketing and external relation, said that the Irkut series was developed in response to a request from Russia's Ministry for Emergency Situation and that they were for civil use only - for oil and gas applications, forest monitoring and perhaps traffic control.
But with system costs varying between US$60,000 right up to US$5 million, depending on payload, the utility to military users cannot be ignored even though it was not a topic open to discussion. Weaponising the platforms was also not on the agenda.
Dr Sautov announced that EADS was taking a 10% share of the Irkut Corporation (possibly worth up to US$70 million).
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