Unmanned hovering air vehicles on the way from Israel Aerospace Industries

We’ve seen a few innovative flying concepts from the Israel Aerospace Industries, and now the Israeli fly-house is developing a set of hovercrafts (hovering aircrafts) for both military and civilian purposes. The ETOP, or the electric tethered observation platform as they call it, is a hovering aircraft which is launched off a fixed station or moving ground vehicle. The cool thing about the ETOP is its ability to launch light, i.e. minus the heavy power source that often works as a disadvantage for the hovering platforms. The IAI’s ETOP stays above ground for long periods limited by the ground platform's energy storage capability alone. The unmanned hovering aircrafts can fly at altitudes of 328ft with a payload of about 20kg. The prototypes of the ETOP are being tested and if the ranks at IAI are believed, the hovercrafts could be up for surveillance tasks by 2011.

etop iai

Via: FlightGlobal