Airforce ‘Killer Zombie’ Drone Is Big, Bad, 100% Recycled
Writing by Evan Ackerman on Monday, 6 of October , 2008 at 5:33 am
You’re looking at a picture of what is probably one of the largest and most powerful UAVs in existence, able to carry over 18,000 pounds of ordinance at a maximum speed of Mach 2.23.
If this aircraft seems familiar, it totally is: it is, of course, the venerable Vietnam-era F-4 Phantom II. Rather than let these aircraft turn to dust out in the desert somewhere, the air force has brought over 230 Phantoms back to life (for a little while, anyway) to serve as aerial target drones. The F-4s are hauled out of storage, spruced up, and refitted for remote computer control, a process that takes seven months and costs about $800,000. Then, they’re sent off to get shot at (most of the time fatally) to test the effectiveness of missile systems against full-scale, high performance aircraft.
Earlier this year, one of the F-4 drones successfully test fired an experimental air to ground high speed anti-radiation missile under remote control, a first for a full-scale unmanned drone. While we already have drones able to fire missiles, they’re subsonic and not especially maneuverable, meaning that many particularly dangerous missions still need to be carried out with higher performance, manned aircraft. It’s possible that the QF-4 (as the drone version of the Phantom has been designated) could fill this niche, using either remote control or full computer control, which is sophisticated enough to fly up to six QF-4s together in formation.
Perhaps the best part about the QF-4 is that it’s a completely recycled aircraft. They’ve got fields of Phantoms just sitting out there, waiting to be put to good use. And at less than $1 million per drone, refitting the F-4s is about 18 times cheaper than a new MQ-9 Reaper with all the trimmings. Not a bad deal, I’d say, although the air force currently has no plans to use the QF-4s as anything but target drones and missile testbeds.
[ Fence Check ] VIA [ Danger Room ]
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Category: Military
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