Unmanned X-47B Drone Makes Its First Flight

The X-47b took its first flight, sparking a whole new era of military remote-piloted, stealthy and deadly combat aircraft. Borrowing from decades of flying wing research, the X-47B is a sleek flying wedge of engines and electronics that's all but invisible to radar, and hard to lock on to with infrared missiles. It's capable of taking off automatically, flying to a location by itself, scanning the scene with a variety of sensors, and then--when commanded to do so by remote pilots--dropping precision-guided weapons on a target, before flying home to an air base or an aircraft carrier. Human pilots require life support systems in aircraft, which increases their weight, and limits their flight envelope--without the pilot aboard, an X-47B-type aircraft could theoretically perform all sorts of crazy aerobatic maneuvers that a human pilot couldn't withstand. The reality of aerial combat in the future will be similar to playing a computer game where by “pilots” will complete missions from remote desktops.