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| First MALE Drone Piaggio P.1HH Hits The Skies |
Just of recent, the first European-built medium-altitude (MALE), long-endurance drone has flown its first flight in Italy using satellite navigation (Spaced-based Technology) and data links provided by an European satellite, its manufacture rightly claimed.
As it is called Piaggio P.1HH the first European MALE Drone, has hitherto made test flights using line-of-sight (LOS) navigation, flew out of Trapani airport in Sicily using the satellite navigation technology provided by the Athena-Fidus satellite in space. However, the linkup was provided by an Italian satellite services company called Telespazio, which is 67% percent controlled by Italy’s Leonardo satellite and 33% percent by Thales. Athena Fidus is managed from Telespazio’s space center in Fucino, Italy. Nevertheless, the test comes as Europe is showing more copious interest in homegrown satellite navigation for drones and drone services, which is on the other hand considered crucial to developing an autonomous UAV able to fly without GPS as the case may be.
The long awaited “EuroMALE” drone, to be built by Airbus, Dassault and Leonardo which we all know that it is an aviation/engineering company, will fly using Europe’s new Galileo satellite system for navigation, Defense News reported earlier this month that even if it will initially also use GPS as a backup means. Leonardo said it used the Piaggio P.1HH as a “test bed” to try its new satellite navigation technology, which could be used to support “European standardization and regulatory activities in the drone sector.”
Although based in Italy, Piaggio P.1HH Aerospace is owned by Mubadala Development Company, an Abu Dhabi-based strategic investment and development company. In early 2016, the United Arab Emirates ordered eight Piaggio P.1HH aircraft and expects the first delivery by the end of this year 2018. Leonardo rightly said Telespazio was also teaming with Italy’s civil air traffic control authority ENAV to develop an air traffic control system for drones, which would handle pref-light planning, flight surveillance, emergency management and flight data recording.
Italy has passed laws to allow drone flights in prearranged airspace corridors, but is now looking forward at integrating UAVs in regular airspace. Telespazio will contribute satellite navigation know-how while Leonardo will act as integrator, the latter firm said in a statement. Leonardo predicted that 400,000 commercial drones will be flying in Europe by 2035.
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