UNMANNED SYSTEMS UPDATE
17 Sep 07. U.S. Army Sees First UAV Kills. When U.S. Army scouts spotted two men planting a roadside bomb 180 miles northwest of Baghdad on Sept. 1, they called in a nearby Hunter unmanned aircraft, which dropped a laser-guided bomb and killed the men. “We had the first confirmed use of an Army weaponized UAV,” said Col. Don Hazelwood, project manager for Army Unmanned Aircraft Systems at Redstone Arsenal, Ala. The Army is mounting precision-guided weapons on hundreds of UAVs in Iraq and Afghanistan, Hazelwood said. The MQ-5B Hunter will carry the laser-guided GBU-44/B Viper Strike, a 42-pound glide bomb with a 1-yard wingspan that can strike within 1 meter of its aim point. The Army plans to increase the number of Viper Strikes it intends to buy, said Tim Owings, the Army’s deputy project manager for UAVs, but he declined to give specific numbers. (Source: Defense News)