Drones
Russia's drone attack: Why China could try it next
Fox News correspondent Mike Tobin has the latest on tensions amid the Russia-Ukraine war on'Special Report.' The Russians planned the Black Sea drone attack carefully, probably for weeks. And watch out, China could try it next. As the admiral played by the late Sen. Fred D. Thompson said to Alec Baldwin's character in the classic movie "The Hunt for Red October," "The Russians don't do anything without a plan." Somebody on the Russian side thought this through.
U.S. says video of drone encounter shows Russia 'flat-out lying'
The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden released dramatic footage of an encounter between Russian fighter jets and an American surveillance drone as the US sought to show that Russia was lying with claims that its warplane never hit the U.S. aircraft. The 42-second video, filmed from the bottom of the MQ-9 Reaper, shows a jet approach in a clear blue sky, release a plume of fuel then swerve away. The video then cuts to what the U.S. says is a second Russian plane approaching the drone. It releases its fuel, nears the drone, and then the video breaks up. When the video returns, it shows the drone flying with a bent propeller.
Autonomous Marker-less Rapid Aerial Grasping
Bauer, Erik, Cangan, Barnabas Gavin, Katzschmann, Robert K.
In a future with autonomous robots, visual and spatial perception is of utmost importance for robotic systems. Particularly for aerial robotics, there are many applications where utilizing visual perception is necessary for any real-world scenarios. Robotic aerial grasping using drones promises fast pick-and-place solutions with a large increase in mobility over other robotic solutions. Utilizing Mask R-CNN scene segmentation (detectron2), we propose a vision-based system for autonomous rapid aerial grasping which does not rely on markers for object localization and does not require the appearence of the object to be previously known. Combining segmented images with spatial information from a depth camera, we generate a dense point cloud of the detected objects and perform geometry-based grasp planning to determine grasping points on the objects. In real-world experiments on a dynamically grasping aerial platform, we show that our system can replicate the performance of a motion capture system for object localization up to 94.5% of the baseline grasping success rate. With our results, we show the first use of geometry-based grasping techniques with a flying platform and aim to increase the autonomy of existing aerial manipulation platforms, bringing them further towards real-world applications in warehouses and similar environments.
Pentagon says its 'highly unlikely' Russia will find anything useful if it recovers US drone from Black Sea
It is "highly unlikely" Russia will find anything useful if it manages to recover a U.S. surveillance drone from the deep waters of the Black Sea where it crashed earlier this week after colliding with a Russian fighter jet, the Pentagon said Thursday. Gen. Pat Ryder comes amid reports that Russia was making an effort to recover the MQ-9 Reaper drone's debris. Ryder reiterated Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley's assertion that no sensitive material was compromised in the drone incident. "We do have indications that Russia's likely making an effort to try to recovery MQ-9 debris," Ryder said. "However, we assess it's very unlikely that they would be able to recovery anything useful, given a couple of factors."
NATO mum in wake of Russia downing US drone; 'time to show steely resolve' says expert
Former U.S. Ambassador to NATO Kurt Volker says the Russian fighter jet collision was'intentional' and requires a'firm response' from the U.S. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has yet to comment publicly on the downing of a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone by two Russian SU-27 fighter jets this week, in what one NATO expert says may be an "overabundance of caution." "There should be broad condemnation of Russia's attack on the U.S. drone by all NATO Allies," Marshall Billingslea, a former deputy undersecretary of the Navy and assistant secretary general for defense investment at NATO, who is now serving as a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told Fox News Digital. "Many, especially those allies on the eastern front, have experience with Russian pilots engaging in aggressive and unprofessional actions." NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg speaks during the annual Society and Defence Conference in Salen, Sweden, on Jan. 8, 2023. The U.S. has accused Russia of purposefully harassing and then striking down the $32 million drone used for intelligence collecting.
Russia flying more armed aircraft over US bases in Syria, US CENTCOM commander says
U.S. CENTCOM Commander Gen. Michael Kurilla told senators Thursday that the Pentagon has seen an "increase recently in the unprofessional and unsafe behavior of the Russian Air Force." U.S. Central Command has seen more "unprofessional" and "unsafe" behavior from Russian pilots in Syria since March 1, a commander said Thursday. Gen. Michael Kurilla explained the ongoing harassment of U.S. forces in the region at a meeting of the Senate Committee on Armed Services. Gen. Michael Kurilla testifies during his Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing in 2022. "What we are seeing, though, is an increase recently in the unprofessional and unsafe behavior of the Russian Air Force in the region," Kurilla stated.
Watch: US releases video of Russian jet dumping fuel on its drone
The Pentagon on Thursday released footage of what it said was a Russian aircraft pouring fuel on a U.S. Air Force surveillance drone and clipping the drone's propeller in international airspace over the Black Sea. The 42-second video shows a Russian Su-27 approaching the back of the MQ-9 drone and beginning to release fuel as it passes, the Pentagon said. Dumping the fuel appeared to be aimed at blinding its optical instruments and driving it out of the area. On a second approach, either the same jet or another Russian fighter that had been shadowing the MQ-9 struck the drone's propeller, damaging one blade, according to the U.S. military. The U.S. military said it ditched the MQ-9 Reaper in the sea after what it described as the Russian fighter making an unsafe intercept of the unmanned aerial vehicle.
Russian ships at US drone crash site in Black Sea, US official says: 'They wasted no time'
U.S. European Command on Thursday released video of a Russian Su-27 fighter jet colliding with a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone over the Black Sea, March 14. Russian vessels have already arrived at the drone crash site in the Black Sea, a U.S. defense official tells Fox News. Almost immediately after the MQ-9 drone was clipped by a Su-27 fighter jet and downed into the water, Russia sent ships to search the debris field. "They wasted no time," the defense official told Fox News. U.S. European Command on Thursday released video of a Russian Su-27 fighter jet colliding with a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone over the Black Sea, March 14.
McCaul calls Russia's intercept of drone a 'blatant intimidation tactic,' says US 'must not be deterred'
Fox News correspondent Mike Tobin has the latest on tensions amid the Russia-Ukraine war on'Special Report.' EXCLUSIVE: House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul called Russia's interception of a U.S. drone a "blatant intimidation tactic," and stressed the need for the United States to continue its support for Ukraine and security efforts in the region. A Russian Su-27 fighter plane collided with a U.S. MQ-9 Reaper drone, which was conducting "routine operations" over the Black Sea on Tuesday. The jet in question was one of two Su-27's flying in tandem when the collision occurred in international airspace over international waters. "To be clear, the Black Sea is not a Russian lake. The U.S. surveillance drone intercepted by a Russian aircraft was operating in international airspace," McCaul told Fox News Digital.
US releases video of Black Sea drone incident with Russian jet
The United States military has released footage it says is of an unsafe intercept of a US drone by a Russian jet over the Black Sea. The US on Tuesday alleged that a Russian Su-27 fighter jet collided with one of its Reaper surveillance drones in international airspace, forcing it to crash into the sea. Russia denied it deliberately brought the unmanned aerial vehicle down. VIDEO: Two #Russian Su-27s conducted an unsafe & unprofessional intercept w/a @usairforce intelligence, surveillance & reconnaissance unmanned MQ-9 operating w/i international airspace over the #BlackSea March 14. https://t.co/gMbKYNtIeQ The declassified 42-second footage released by the US European Command shows the Su-27 fighter jet approaching the back of the MQ-9 drone, the Pentagon said.