The Predator B will soon replace the Predator A+ in the Afghan operational theater. The “Predator B” boasts significantly superior capabilities and characteristics compared to the “Predator A+”, while retaining the unique feature of being unarmed. In fact, the new device is equipped with high-resolution sensors that provide a
Full motion video (video broadcast in real time) much clearer and more detailed in detail, allowing for higher flight altitudes without compromising on visual quality.
Furthermore, the helicopter’s turboprop engine allows for a reduction in arrival and departure times from the operational area, so that its flight range can be used much more effectively for the objective to be acquired and less for technical purposes. Additionally, the new aircraft allows for operations even in adverse weather conditions, such as the presence of rain, wind, and ice. Last but not least, the Predator B is equipped, in addition to the previous version, with a synthetic aperture radar (SAR),
Synthetic Aperture Radar), which allows you to have radar images by expanding the range of products to support analysts.
The remote-piloted MQ-9A aircraft will therefore immediately provide the multinational coalition and the Afghan Security Forces with a “
eye from above”significantly more advanced, more flexible and more effective in carrying out intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance and air support missions.”.
The first mission, which lasted about an hour, allowed for numerous tests on the ground and in flight, which in turn enabled the perfect functioning of all the equipment, the technical preparations, and the basic procedures necessary for conducting flight operations, thus leading to the certification of initial operational capability (IOC).,
Initial Operational Capability).
Today, following further test flights, the final operational capability (FOC,
Final operational capability) of this modern and sophisticated aircraft.
The Predators employed by the Air Force in Afghanistan to support the ISAF mission belong to the “task group”
Astore”, which in turn is framed within
Joint Air Task Force del
Regional Command West which, under the command of Colonel Francesco Saverio Agresti, gathers all the fixed-wing aircraft currently deployed by Italy in the Afghan operational theater.
For further details, please consult the information sheets of the ISAF mission published on the website of the European Union.
Defence Staff.
