The BAE Systems HERTI is an unmanned aerial vehicle

Unmanned aerial vehicle

An unmanned aerial vehicle , also known as a unmanned aircraft system , remotely piloted aircraft or unmanned aircraft, is a machine which functions either by the remote control of a navigator or pilot or autonomously, that is, as a self-directing entity...

 (UAV) developed by the British company BAE Systems

BAE Systems

BAE Systems plc is a British multinational defence, security and aerospace company headquartered in London, United Kingdom, that has global interests, particularly in North America through its subsidiary BAE Systems Inc. BAE is among the world's largest military contractors; in 2009 it was the...

. HERTI stands for "High Endurance Rapid Technology Insertion" and was developed in Warton

Warton, Fylde

Warton is a village on the Fylde in Lancashire, England.The village is about six miles from Preston and eight miles from Blackpool. It is located on the banks of the River Ribble, close to its entry into the Irish Sea. It is best known for its airfield, BAE Warton and its associated aircraft works...

, United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

. The HERTI airframe is based on a motor glider

Motor glider

A motor glider is a fixed-wing aircraft that can be flown with or without engine power. The FAI Gliding Commission Sporting Code definition is: A fixed wing aerodyne equipped with a means of propulsion ,...

 designed by Jaroslaw Janowski of J&AS Aero Design, Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

. Its first flight was in December 2004 at the Australian Woomera test range where much of the test flight programme has been undertaken. HERTI was also the first UAV to fly in the UK with the flight being certified by the United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority

United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority

The Civil Aviation Authority is the public corporation which oversees and regulates all aspects of aviation in the United Kingdom. The CAA head office is located in the CAA House on Kingsway in Holborn, London Borough of Camden...

.

The first vehicles had a maximum take-off weight of 450 kilograms (992.1 lb) and a payload of about 150 kilograms (330.7 lb). However the first production example will, according to Flight International

Flight International

Flight International is a global aerospace weekly publication produced in the UK. Founded in 1909, it is the world's oldest continuously published aviation news magazine...

, weigh about 750 kilograms (1,653.5 lb). The first production example will be delivered by Slingsby Aviation

Slingsby Aviation

Slingsby Aviation is a British aircraft company based in Kirkbymoorside, North Yorkshire, England. The Slingsby business was founded on the building and design of gliders and sailplanes. From the early 1930s to about 1970 it built over 50% of all British club gliders and had success at national and...

 to BAE Systems at the end of November 2007. The endurance of the production variant is up to 20 hours.

An armed version, the BAE Fury, was announced in 2008.

Australia

The HERTI UAV started flight trials in Australia in late 2004. Since then, quite a few key points have been addressed, however, slightly slower than BAE Systems wanted to. The two main test centres are the Woomera range in central Australia and the West Sale airbase

West Sale Airport

West Sale Airport is located about 5 km west of Sale, Victoria, Australia, off the Princes Highway....

 which is in south-east Australia. In late 2006 a HERTI vehicle flew several fully autonomous missions from the Woomera test centre to expand the flight envelope

Flight envelope

In aerodynamics, the flight envelope or performance envelope of an aircraft refers to the capabilities of a design in terms of airspeed and load factor or altitude. The term is somewhat loosely applied, and can also refer to other measurements such as maneuverability...

, or distance and height limits to which the UAV has flown in real tests. In mid-2007 BAE Systems started a flight campaign to increase the flight envelope even further, this time from West Sale airbase. In these trials the HERTI UAV should fly 28 km from base and at altitudes of about 1830 metres (6,003.9 ft) To achieve a UAV that can safely fly within civilian airspace, BAE Systems is developing a "sense and avoid" system for HERTI, utilising a radar

Radar

Radar is an object-detection system which uses radio waves to determine the range, altitude, direction, or speed of objects. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. The radar dish or antenna transmits pulses of radio...

 and electro-optical systems.

United Kingdom

The relatively few flight tests undertaken in the UK have been done over the Machrihanish

Machrihanish

Machrihanish is a village in Argyll, Scotland. Machrihanish has a classic links golf course described by many as the defining links course in Scotland.Campbeltown Airport, formerly RAF Machrihanish, is located near the village...

 bay, flying from Campbeltown Airport

Campbeltown Airport

Campbeltown Airport is located at Machrihanish, west of Campbeltown, near the tip of the Kintyre peninsula in Argyll and Bute on the west coast of Scotland...

. Due to these flights in 2005, BAE Systems claims that it was the first UAV to fly in the UK with a CAA certification.

Operational debut in Afghanistan

Under Project Morrigan, BAE Systems deployed a HERTI UAV to Afghanistan

Afghanistan

Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

 where it flew missions from Camp Bastion

Camp Bastion

Camp Bastion is the main British military base in Afghanistan. Accommodating 21,000 people it is situated northwest of Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand Province, and exists to be the logistics hub for operations in Helmand....

. Specific mission profiles are still Classified information

Classified information

Classified information is sensitive information to which access is restricted by law or regulation to particular groups of persons. A formal security clearance is required to handle classified documents or access classified data. The clearance process requires a satisfactory background investigation...

, however the system did send data back to the UK in a procedure called "reach back" and BAE Systems claims that the deployment was a success. The Royal Air Force

Royal Air Force

The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...

 said that the HERTI was successful "in demonstrating its capability in an operational environment".

Military and other uses

Currently BAE Systems is showing the HERTI to potential customers at various air shows, such as the Farnborough Airshow, Dubai

Dubai

Dubai is a city and emirate in the United Arab Emirates . The emirate is located south of the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula and has the largest population with the second-largest land territory by area of all the emirates, after Abu Dhabi...

 Air Show and others. The potential for HERTI use by the British police and border control forces has been mentioned. Other potential fields of application for HERTI and other UAVs are the oil and gas industry, traffic control, coastal protection, search and rescue and many more.

Variants

HERTI-1D: The first prototype, jet-powered

Jet engine

A jet engine is a reaction engine that discharges a fast moving jet to generate thrust by jet propulsion and in accordance with Newton's laws of motion. This broad definition of jet engines includes turbojets, turbofans, rockets, ramjets, pulse jets...

, HERTI version. It uses the same powerplant

PowerPlant

PowerPlant is an object-oriented GUI toolkit, application framework and set of class libraries for Mac OS, created by Metrowerks. The framework was fairly popular at the height of the Classic Mac OS era, and was primarily used with CodeWarrior...

, systems and ground station as the BAE Corax. Its mass is about 350 kilograms (771.6 lb). The HERTI-1D was based on the J&AS Aero Design J5 Marco motor glider. BAE Systems quickly realised that a piston engine powered HERTI had a better payload and endurance than the HERTI-1D and subsequently discontinued its development.
HERTI-1A: Powered by a BMW

BMW

Bayerische Motoren Werke AG is a German automobile, motorcycle and engine manufacturing company founded in 1916. It also owns and produces the Mini marque, and is the parent company of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars. BMW produces motorcycles under BMW Motorrad and Husqvarna brands...

 piston engine, with a larger, modified composite airframe based on the J&AS Aero Design J6 Fregata motor glider with a higher endurance and payload than the HERTI-1D. Top speed with an ICE ("Image Collection and Exploitation") system is 125 knots.
HERTI-1B: Powered by a Rotax

Rotax

BRP-Powertrain GmbH & Co KG , commonly known simply as Rotax, is an Austrian engine manufacturer. It develops and produces four-stroke and advanced two-stroke engines for Bombardier Recreational Products products as well as for motorcycles, karts,...

 piston engine and controlled by multi-lane flight controls. This variant also has the more advanced autonomous ICE II mission system (payload).

Fury: BAE Systems announced it was investigating an armed version of HERTI in 2006. At the 2008 Farnborough International Air Show, this variant was unveiled as the Fury armed reconnaissance and close air support UAS (Unmanned Autonomous System). The Fury is a equipped with a new stores management system and armed with the Thales

Thales

Thales of Miletus was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher from Miletus in Asia Minor, and one of the Seven Sages of Greece. Many, most notably Aristotle, regard him as the first philosopher in the Greek tradition...

 Lightweight Multi-role Missile (LMM).
HERTI-OC: BAE Systems are pursuing a UK civil certification licence for the HERTI-OC (Operational Capability) standard of aircraft featuring a completely new airframe and suite of Flight and Mission Systems. The program is on an incremental development program and is working closely with the UK Civil Aviation Authority. Initial plans were to see the aircraft flying from the Walney Island range in the UK, close to the home of the HERTI in Warton. However the CAA would ultimately put an end to these aspirations despite the best efforts of BAE Systems' engineers. Following this the flight trials were reportedly moved to an overseas location pending further discussions with the CAA. The aircraft itself featured a newly designed, stronger airframe allowing for operations from unprepared strips, greater payload and longer endurance and is built by Slingsby Advanced Composites in the UK. The Flight Systems, while loosely based around the previous versions of the vehicle, undertook a massive redesign to comply with Civil Certification requirements. The Mission system is also of a more advanced design, however due to the modular design of the Unmanned Aircraft System, the Mission System remains 'plug and play' that successful flight of the aircraft does not depend upon.

Future developments

High altitude, long endurance version of HERTI: A proposed HALE version of HERTI should have a bigger wing span to achieve the higher endurance and the higher altitudes needed for such a UAV.
Catapult launched

Aircraft catapult

An aircraft catapult is a device used to launch aircraft from ships—in particular aircraft carriers—as a form of assisted take off. It consists of a track built into the flight deck, below which is a large piston or shuttle that is attached through the track to the nose gear of the aircraft, or in...

 version of HERTI: Tests have been carried out in 2005 in Finland

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

 to see if the HERTI could be catapult launched. The Finnish company Robonic

Robonic

Robonic is a Finnish company, which is specializing in manufacturing pneumatic driven catapult launchers for unmanned aerial vehicles .Robonics main office is in Tampere. The company has also access to a large testing facility in Northern Lapland....

 has developed a "dummy mass" to simulate a HERTI launch. A real launch has, as of July 2006 not been carried out.

Specifications (HERTI-OC)