US Navy drone launch footage

[Man On The Clapham Omnibus]

http://www.youtube.com/embed/WC8U5_4lo2c?feature=player_embedded_

 

For those fascinated by aircraft carriers, modern aircraft, and a things military...

[Norman Verona]

Sorry, not for me. All weapons of mass destruction should be banned. This one us even more chilling than a bomb delivered on a rocket.

[Man On The Clapham Omnibus]

I incline towards pacifism too, Norman, but still get a frisson from these magnificent examples of engineering. And it gives comfort to know that nominally, at least, they're on our side. While the world is as unstable as it is, and always will be with people in charge, such things will remain regrettably necessary.  

[peet]

Modern warfares so boring, so wrong and no huge leaps in technology anymore, any humaness humanity removed. Truly awful all optimism removed.

Imagine top gun now - heck yeah I can press buttons and fly a damn fine remote control.... inspiring stuff? Nah not for me!

Gimme a Harrier or Lightning any day!

Jeez I get grumpier every year!! Hehe

[Paul Hurdsfield - Joint Manchester AO]

Wow, brilliant find

[Norman Verona]

Clive these remote controlled aircraft are designed for attack only, they would be useless for defence.

 

Some people see the instability in the world due to western policies who have attacked two Islamic countries and offered serious threats to a third.

[SootySport]

Unmanned military aircraft leave me cold.  

[Man On The Clapham Omnibus]

Norman, of course you are right but the engineering....

 

I go to airshows and find myself wracked with dilemmas when I see a fighter or bomber aircraft, knowing they are designed only for killing, but still finding the hairs on the back of my neck standing up at the sheer spectacle. 

 

 

Nurse! Time for the tablets......

[Tom Frankland (T3OMF)]

That's the dogs nuts.............. 

[Man On The Clapham Omnibus]

I sent this to my son on November 11th as it seemed somehow appropriate if a little different from the usual:

 

 

He who wrote this:

 

"High Flight"

 

 Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth

 And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

 Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

 of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things

 You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung

 High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,

 I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung

 My eager craft through footless halls of air....

 

 Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue

 I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace.

 Where never lark, or even eagle flew —

 And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod

 The high untrespassed sanctity of space,

 - Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

 

Also wrote this before he was killed, aged 19, in a flying accident. It's a sonnet to Rupert Brooke

 

"We laid him in a cool and shadowed grove   One evening in the dreamy scent of thyme   Where leaves were green, and whispered high above —   A grave as humble as it was sublime;   There, dreaming in the fading deeps of light —   The hands that thrilled to touch a woman's hair;   Brown eyes, that loved the Day, and looked on Night,   A soul that found at last its answered Prayer...   There daylight, as a dust, slips through the trees.   And drifting, gilds the fern around his grave —   Where even now, perhaps, the evening breeze   Steals shyly past the tomb of him who gave   New sight to blinded eyes; who sometimes wept —   A short time dearly loved; and after, — slept."   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gillespie_Magee,_Jr.

 

[M444TTB]

Drones are scary. I've seen The Terminator.

[Buzz Billsberry]

Excellent piece of footage....landing aUAV on a aircraft carrier is mighty impressive especially with the pilot either sat 4decks down in a ops room or in a land based room. Landing an aircraft on a pitching,rolling deck is one of the most difficult pieces of flying you can do but even more so when your not strapped to the thing and sat in a chair in an office watching it on a screen puts a whole new meaning to PS4 !

Buzz

[ALLADDIN]

 Landing an aircraft on a pitching,rolling deck is one of the most difficult pieces of flying you can do but even more so when your not strapped to the thing and sat in a chair

 

why ?    my kids seem to manage ok ?  

[pistonbroke]

these days ships can sail the 7 seas without pilots , how long before international flight goes the same way ?

[Man On The Clapham Omnibus]

The final state of affairs will be, Bernie, when pilotless airliners take passengerless aircraft around the world while we sleep. We'll all sit at home with our 3D surround vision, multi source sound, full frequency vibra-seat, smell-o-vision computer terminals! We might even catch engineered-to-be-safe STDs from virtual holiday flings...