The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is working on two new types of unmanned surveillance aircraft, one that would ride on a ballistic missile and the other that could ride at very high altitude for five years or more, reports Scientific American. A 500-pound Rapid Eye would ride on board a missile that could deliver it to any spot on the globe within an hour and would deploy under its own steam to provide reconnaissance for at least seven hours without refueling. The Vulture would sustain itself at very high altitude possibly via solar energy and include a refueling capability, both of which would enable it to stay aloft over a target area for a very long, long time.
The Air Force rolled out new interim height standards for Career Enlisted Aviators aimed at improving aircrew diversity and “safely meeting accession demands,” as the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center works to update a 1967 anthropometric study used to establish USAF flight requirements for more than half a century.…