Glossary

A Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) is an aircraft (such as a drone) with no pilot on board.  UAVs come in two varieties:

• controlled from a remote location
• flying autonomously.

Autonomous flight continues to develop from pre-programmed flight plans towards flight and decisions derived automatically from specification of a task or objective. Military UAVs perform reconnaissance as well as attack missions. UAVs are also used in a small but growing number of civil applications, such as firefighting and crop spraying.

An unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV) or “”combat drone”” is an experimental class of UAV. A UCAV differs from ordinary UAVs, because it is designed specifically to attack targets. Current UCAV concepts call for an aircraft which would be able to operate virtually autonomously. It would be programmed with route and target details, and would be able to conduct the mission without help from human controllers