As part of a lease agreement, Poland will take delivery of MQ-9A Reaper Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) from General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. (GA-ASI). The agreement between GA-ASI and the Polish Ministry of Defence is valued at USD 70.6 million. MQ-9A Reapers are operated by the United States, the UK, France, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain. GA-ASI’s newer MQ-9B variant has been acquired by the UK and Belgium. The MQ-9B maritime surveillance configuration (SeaGuardian) recently began operations in support of the Japanese Coast Guard.
MQ-9A Reaper has endurance of over 27 hours, it can attain speeds of 123. 5 m/s (240 KTAS) and can operate at altitudes up to 15,240 m (50,000 ft). It has a 1,746 kg payload capacity that includes 1,361 kg of external stores. It provides a long-endurance, persistent surveillance capability with Full-Motion Video (FMV) and Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR)/Moving Target Indicator (MTI)/Maritime Radar. MQ-9A Block 5 is equipped with a fault-tolerant flight control system and a triple-redundant avionics system architecture.
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