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Alenia tests Sky-Y UAV in Italy
By: Curt Epstein
Caption: Alenia Aeronautica’s Sky-Y unmanned technology demonstrator has completed its most recent series of tests in Italy.
Word Count: 195
Alenia Aeronautica’s Sky-Y unmanned technology demonstrator has completed its most recent series of tests in Italy. The Sky-Y has made 19 flights, in Sweden and in its home country, and the Finmeccanica subsidiary (Hall 2 Stand A165) claims that it is the only entirely European unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to have begun flight testing. The most recent tests, which focused on evaluating automatic functions of the UAV’s ground surveillance missions, concluded in March. They were conducted in the Puglia region after Italy’s National Agency for Civil Aviation (ENAC) granted the program a permit to fly. In a series of missions that simulated ground surveillance, fire control, detection and monitoring of boat traffic and signaling to shipwrecked mariners,  Italy’s Civil Defense Agency tested the aircraft’s satellite communications link–produced by Telespazio–which is capable of providing real-time data and image transmission. The recent tests also continued the evaluation of the EOST-45 electro-optical sensor developed by Selex Galileo, and through the UAV’s on-board mission computer, the abilities of automatic target tracking, automatic scanning of predetermined areas and determination of the geographic coordinates of targets on land and, for the first time, at sea.