The Ukrainian manufacturer of unmanned aerial vehicles Athlon Avia company, a member of NAUDI (the National Association of Ukrainian Defense Industries) presented the modernized Furia A2-S UAS for the first time at the MSPO-2024 exhibition in Poland earlier this month. The company did not disclose detailed information about this drone, limiting itself to data that it has an increased flight time and is able to carry more payload.
At the same time, the Athlon Avia company finally decided to reveal more information about its new development - the journalists of the dev.ua publication, who saw the updated reconnaissance drone with their own eyes, spoke with the company's general director Artem Vyunnyk.
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First of all, from the words of the general director of the Athlon Avia company, it appears that the predecessor of the updated UAV, A1SM Furia drone, which has been in operation on the battlefield for 10 years, is gradually exhausting its capabilities and is unable to perform the entire range of tasks that are currently to be performed in interests of artillery units. Therefore, taking into account the modern realities of the battlefield, there was a need to modernize (actually create a new version) the Furia UAV with an emphasis on increasing the duration and range of the flight.
The tactical and technical characteristics of the new drone, which is created according to the same "flying wing" scheme as the previous version, are still not disclosed. At the same time, Artem Vyunnyk notes that the duration of the flight of the Furia A2-S UAV is almost six hours, which is twice as much as compared to the first version of the UAV, for which this indicator was three hours/ It should be noted, that a radius of action of the A1SM Furia was 50 km, while the length of the route - up to 200 km.
The Furia A2-S UAV also differs from the previous version in that it has a much larger internal volume of the aircraft body, where you can put "everything that is necessary" - Artem Vyunnyk emphasizes that the updated UAV will become the foundation for its further improvements over the next 10 years
"The increased internal volume of the Furia A2-S UAV, unlike the Furia A1SM UAV, allows us to put modern GPS signal receivers, computers, and payloads there. That is, we can rethink almost everything, and we have a huge reserve of volume to install and install. That is, this model of the drone is the foundation on which the board can be built, developed and improved in the next 10 years", says the director of the Athlon Avia company.
He also reported on a number of design features used in the new UAV. "In the first version of the Furia, the hatch from which the landing parachute flies out is located on top. We made the top of the A2-C side completely smooth. Both the camera and, accordingly, the parachute of the second version of the Furia are located below. By the same logic, all the other technological hatches, i.e. the replaceable battery and additional load, are also located below in the respective boxes. In addition, we build all our products so that they can actually function with each other, work in the network and be repeaters for each other," Artem Vyunnyk noted.
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