The Aircraft of British Aerospace and BAE SYSTEMS 1977 - 2017 127Soarer experience first flew at Woomera
on 17 December 2003. Incorporating
stealth technology, the finless Raven
Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV )
tested vehicle control concepts. Raven
carried out several highly successful
flights and was fully autonomous from
take-off to landing. It was followed by a
second prototype in November 2004.
(The Future Offensive Air System
programme was tasked with developing
a replacement for the Royal Air Force’s
Tornado GR4 strike aircraft. It was
cancelled in 2005.)
Demonstrating rapid engineering
process, the Raven was followed little
over a year later by Corax URAV
(Unmanned Reconnaissance Aerial
Vehicle) which drew on much of the
technology developed for the Raven. It
re-used much of the Raven; the fuselage,
engine and undercarriage, married to a
new composite wing built BAE Systems’
advanced manufacturing facility at
BAE goEs UAV
Samlesbury. In common with Raven, the
Corax is fully autonomous from take-off
to landing and capable of collecting
reconnaissance imagery and transmitting
it using very low bandwidth. Just like
Kestrel and Raven the development
programme was very short and took only
ten months from concept to first flight.HERTI and Fury
The next UAV development, the HERTI
(High Endurance Rapid Technology
Insertion) came in three versions all based
on Polish motor glider designs. The first,
the HERTI 1D was derived from the J5
motor glider but refitted with a jet engine
from the Corax. Initial flight trials took
place from December 2004 to January
2005 at Woomera. The HERTI 1D was
succeeded by the HERTI 1A based on the
larger J6 powered glider and powered by
a BMW piston engine. On 18 August 2005,
the HERTI 1A (registered G-8-008) became
the first unmanned aircraft to make a fully
autonomous flight, including take-off and
landing in the UK. Flying in and out of the
remote airfield at Campbeltown, the
whole flight was initiated by a click of a
mouse!
The more-powerful Rotax-engined
HERTI 1B was trialled by the RAF at Camp
Bastion in Afghanistan’s Helmand
province during 2007. It can carry a
payload of up to 150kg (330lb), including
a full motion video or infrared sensor, plus
one fixed narrow field-of-view and two
wide field-of-view stills camera. BAE had
hoped to receive an urgent operational
requirement contract to operate the
On 18 August 2005, the HERTI 1A
(registered G-8-008) became the first
unmanned aircraft to make a fully
autonomous flight, including take-off and
landing in the UK from Campbeltown
airport. (BAE SYSTEMS North West Heritage) The Fury was an armed version of the
HERTI flown at Woomera. (BAE Systems)