BRITISH ARMY $195,000 SPY DRONE That Fits in the PALM of Your HAND - Intro to the Black Hornet Nano

BRITISH ARMY $195,000 SPY DRONE That Fits in the PALM of Your HAND - Intro to the Black Hornet Nano

The Black Hornet Nano is a military micro unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developed by Prox Dynamics AS of Norway, and in use by the British Army.

The unit measures around 10 cm x 2.5 cm and provides troops on the ground with local situational awareness. They are small enough to fit in one hand and weigh just over half an ounce (including batteries). The UAV is equipped with a camera which gives the operator full-motion video and still images and were developed as part of a £20 million contract for 160 units with Marlborough Communications Ltd.



The aircraft are being used by soldiers from the UK's Brigade Reconnaissance Force at Camp Bastion in Afghanistan.[4] Operation Herrick personnel in Afghanistan deploy the Black Hornet from the front line to fly into enemy territory to take video and still images before returning to the operator.

Designed to blend in with the muddy grey walls in Afghanistan, it has been used to look around corners or over walls and other obstacles to identify any hidden dangers and enemy positions. The images are displayed on a small handheld terminal which can be used by the operator to control the UAV.

Sergeant Carl James Boyd of the 1st Royal Regiment of Fusiliers demonstrates how the Norwegian-designed Black Hornet Nano will be used by troops on the front line in Afghanistan.

The tiny handheld surveillance helicopters contains a camera that beams back video and still images to a handheld control terminal, allowing soldiers to see past obstacles to identify potential hidden dangers.

The remote-controlled drone measures about 4in by 1in and weighs 0.6oz

Black Hornet: British Army unveil latest weapon against the Taliban
Sergeant Carl Boyd shows off a remote controlled miniature helicopter with three cameras on-board.

British troops in Afghanistan are now using 10-centimeter-long 16-gram spy helicopters to survey Taliban firing spots. The UK Defense Ministry plans to buy 160 of the drones under a contract worth more than $31 million.

­The remote-controlled PD-100 PRS aircraft, dubbed the Black Hornet, is produced by Norwegian designer Prox Dynamics. The drone is a traditional single-rotor helicopter, scaled down to the size of a toy. British troops use the drones for reconnaissance missions, sending them ahead to inspect enemy positions.

Each drone is equipped with a tiny tillable camera, a GPS coordinate receiver and an onboard autopilot system complete with gyros, accelerometers and pressure sensors, which keeps it stable in flight against winds as strong as 10 knots, according to reviews. The tiny aircraft is agile enough to fly inside compounds, and is quiet enough not to attract unwanted attention. If detected, the drones are cheap enough to be considered expendable.

The auto-pilot either follows a preprogrammed flight plan or receives commands from a manual control station, which is about the size of a large smartphone. The drone's camera can feed compressed video or still images to an operator up to a kilometer away, and its rechargeable battery provides power for about 30 minutes of flight.
In addition to the drone and the controller, each system comes with a ground base station, which houses the operating system, main electronics, internal batteries and chargers. It also protects the drone while being transported. The weight of the entire kit is about a kilogram, easily portable in the field.

Prox Dynamics started working on the nano-drone in 2008, and released a video of the first prototype in flight a year later. The manufacturer initially planned for it to be put to civilian use, to scout sites of natural or man-made disasters for survivors and provide intel to rescue teams. A marketable version of the Black Hornet was first presented at the Counter Terrorist Expo in London in April 2012.