BAE Systems HERTI

The BAE Systems HERTI is an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developed by the British company BAE Systems. HERTI stands for "High Endurance Rapid Technology Insertion" and was developed in Warton, United Kingdom. The HERTI airframe is based on a motor glider designed by Jaroslaw Janowski of J&AS Aero Design, Poland. 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.

The first vehicles had a maximum take-off weight of and a payload of about . However the first production example will, according to Flight International, weigh about . The first production example will be delivered by Slingsby Aviation 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.

Flight test programme

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 which is in south-east Australia. In late 2006 a HERTI vehicle flew several fully autonomous missions...
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