BAE Systems and Lindstrand Technologies update the GA-22 Airship

© BAE Systems

At the Farnborough Airshow that ended last sunday BAE Systems announced they are planning to integrate their existing Unmanned Autonomous Systems in the Lindstrand GA-22 Airhship. The GA-22 Airship was first supplied to the Ministry of Defense in Spain in 2004 and carried a 42kg load. Read the full press release below:

BAE SYSTEMS FLOATS AUTONOMOUS SYTEM AT FARNBOROUGH INTERNATIONAL
14 Jul 2008 | Ref. FI020/2008

A 22 meter long airship, originally developed by balloonist and adventurer Per Lindstrand, could become the latest addition to BAE Systems growing portfolio of autonomous systems.

The GA22 airship, perfect for deployment into roles such as communications relay stations, will be updated and adapted to carry payloads, such as high tech surveillance equipment at up to 150 kilograms in weight, to heights of more than 6,500 feet

BAE Systems plan to integrate their existing Unmanned Autonomous Systems into the GA22 making the technology more accessible to potential users.

“Strategically, GA22 fits perfectly into the autonomous fleet that we are developing“said Richard Williams, Director of Civil Autonomous Systems at BAE Systems “The new vehicle has the possibility of opening up a range of markets for BAE Systems. It has a range of unique capabilities and we have identified a number of roles at major events, from sporting occasions to floods and forest fires, for which GA22 is ideal”.

BAE Systems designers and engineers have worked with Lindstrand Technologies to update the original design. GA22 will be able to carry high-tech surveillance equipment, including a payload of up to 150 kilograms, to heights of more than 6,500ft. In addition, it is being made from a newer and lighter material, which improves the airship’s performance. At the moment GA22 is radio controlled, but the plan is to make it fully autonomous.

Richard continued: “Even more exciting are the long-term prospects for success. I have no doubt that GA22 can make a significant contribution to our civil autonomous systems business,” Richard concludes.

About BAE Systems

BAE Systems is the premier global defence and aerospace company delivering a full range of products and services for air, land and naval forces, as well as advanced electronics, information technology solutions and customer support services. With 97,500 employees worldwide, BAE Systems' sales exceeded £15.7 billion (US $31.4 billion) in 2007.

The UK based Company of Per Lindstrand has specialized on Inflatable Structures, Tehtered balloons, and Lighter-Than-Air Vehicles. You can read a bit more about the GA-22 Airship on their website. Per Lindstrand also owns the GA-42 Airship the worlds first fly-by-wire that was introduced in 1980. If you want to have a look at the Type Certificate jump over to the FAA Website

Airship Surveillance - continues at high pace

© Airship Surveillance

It's been just over a month since our last post about Airship Surveillance and they are continuing at an extremely high pace. Airship Surveillance has issued no less than 8 press releases in the last 4 weeks. By distributing them through Marketwire they reach a broad audience very quickly.

So what has been going on with Airship Surveillance in the last month, you have the option to read all the press releases yourself or just continue on and read our summary. Beginning of May WENR Corp which has been working closely with Airship Surveillance announced a letter of intent to acquire them. Which was followed up with more information about the aquisition and a Letter to the shareholders. This letter contained some very interesting bits about the current developments in the company. They informed that:

... AirSur is currently in discussions concerning six potential sales opportunities. These contracts include several L15, L5 and L2 airships which will have a value measured in the tens of millions of dollars if all are exercised and completed. In addition to outright sales, AirSur is also in discussions regarding the 'wet lease' of aircraft in which it will operate its aircraft for clients.

They are also planing a Media Day and might be looking for new full time staff. The press release reads:

Finally, the foreseen growth and sales of subsequent airships will require AirSur to possibly seek an even larger facility and hire additional full-time staff. WENR is also looking into adding additional members to its Board of Directors to reflect the Company's new direction.

A few days after the letter Airship Surveillance announced that:

Sandy Mangold has been appointed as Vice President of the Company and has been elected to its Board of Directors.

Sandy Mangold is, according to the press release, a retired Colonel from the U.S. Air Force and has been working with Airship Surveillance from the very beginning. CEO Paul Adams was quoted in the press release saying:

"He (Mangold) will be responsible for generating sales, business strategy, and overall growth of Airship Surveillance."

Also beginning of may Airship Surveillance was able to announce a first contract with a government contractor. This is what Sandy Mangold had to say:

"We are pleased to announce the award of a systems engineering contract with a Las Vegas-based company, which has extensive contacts in defense, energy, and academic communities," stated Sandy Mangold of AirSur. "Airship Surveillance will conduct integration studies for a wide range of biological, chemical and radiation sensors, which could be flown on our airships. Further, the contract also calls for the Company to develop an accompanying series of deployment concepts (Concepts of Operations) for each specific set of payload suites."

In parallel they are also developing the L2 airship further. Pilot training has started and the first custom build airship is being build for a client. Just yesterday a press release was issued informing that Airship Surveillance...

... will welcome representatives of three prospective clients during the month of June from the Defense, Homeland Security, and commercial communities.

The visitors will specifically view development and operations areas of Airship Surveillance. Each entity will get to view and see first-hand the company's newest airship, the L 2 (named the "Flying Cloud" in honor of the famous 19th Century US Clipper Ship,) which will be finished the first week of June. Each client's inspection will be several days in length.

Airship Surveillance has also put a few more videos into their YouTube Channel the newest of them were put into a playlist by me. The first video shows trial flights of the R&D1 indoors the second the R&D1 passing in front of the inflated envelope of the new L2 airship and the last video contains footage of the L2 airship envelope acceptance test. Enjoy!

Airship Surveillance Playlist

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The home made Robotic Blimp

© Surveyor Corporation

The Surveyor Corporation is currently working on constructing a small robotic blimp called YARB 1.0 (Yet Another Robotic Blimp) in their weekly update on their Build Log they report their progress regularly. It's quite impressive what is possible with just a little bit of electronics. So if you are interested in remote controlled blimps, autonomous blimps, and UAVs head over to the YARB Buildlog. They also have a video of each development step on their Site and on YouTube.

More on Airship Surveillance Inc.

© Airship Surveillance Inc.

We did a little bit of searching and dug out a couple press releases concerning Airship Surveillance Inc. Here are they in newest to oldest order, most interesting is probably the newest one released this Thursday regarding the Letter of Intent by Auxillia a company focusing on Unmanned System Technologies.

• Airship Surveillance Receives LOI From Auxilia
• Airship Surveillance Begins Construction of L2 Airship
• Airship Surveillance Announces Successful Airship Test
• Airship Surveillance Appoints New Board Member
• Airship Surveillance Sets First Flight Target Date
• Airship Surveillance Announces Testing Milestone
• First Airship to Be Launched in March
• WENR Negotiating Marketing Agreement for Airship

The configuration of the propulsion system used by Airship Surveillance is very similar to that of Daniel Geerys Hyperblimp and of course can also be seen in some of the airships flown during the RC Airship Regatta. Check out the videos of Hinkelstein, Homer and LarsPing. If you have more info about Airship Surveillance or want to discuss the role of UAVs and airships for security purposes head over to our Forum and start a new topic, it's now integrated into the Airshipworld site and looks mighty fine. Let us know what you think. Also please remember that we are still looking for speakers for the Airshipworld Conference the end of May 2008. If you have a topic that you would like to talk about please let us know by the end of the week.