AfterDawn: Tech news

U.S. Navy to install Linux on VTOL drones

Written by Andre Yoskowitz @ 09 Jun 2012 7:29 User comments (2)

U.S. Navy to install Linux on VTOL drones The U.S. Navy will begin installing the Linux operating system on its vertical take-off (VTOL) drones.
For now, the military branch only has one VTOL drone, but will eventually have 168.

The new deal is with military contractor Raytheon, worth $28 million, and will cover a "Linux transition on the tactical control system software for vertical take-off (VTOL) unmanned air vehicle ground control stations."

A VTOL "has the ability to autonomously take off and land on any aviation-capable warship and at prepared and unprepared landing zones in proximity to the soldier in contact."

The Navy's single MQ-8B Fire Scout is currently used in South America to search for drug smugglers. It can fly as high as 20,000 feet at a speed of 100MPH.

Many believe the move to Linux is due to the malware attack suffered by the Air Force's Windows-based drone system last year.

Previous Next  

2 user comments

111.6.2012 12:49

ssh root@vtol /bin/sh /home/commands/immediate/killallthehumans.sh

216.6.2012 03:30

Originally posted by plazma247:
ssh root@vtol /bin/sh /home/commands/immediate/killallthehumans.sh
So *that's* how SkyNet got turned against its human makers. I was wondering about that... ;-)

Comments have been disabled for this article.

News archive