FlyingBasket and Bayerische Staatsforsten (BaySF) joined forces to test the use of cargo drones for tree planting in the mountains. After FlyingBasket obtained crossborder operation authorisation by the Federal Aviation Office in Germany, the team was able to start the trial by transporting 2,000 young trees from a location in the valley of Aschau, Southern Bavaria, to 18 planting locations up in the mountains near the famous Kampenwand.

Kaman Air Vehicles, a division of Kaman Aerospace Corporation, announced today the first flight of its new unmanned helicopter, the K-MAX TITAN™. The world’s first heavy lift unmanned helicopter for the commercial market, K-MAX TITAN™ leads the way in repetitive, heavy lift without the constraints of manned operations. With a focus on enabling safety and operational efficiency, the proprietary K-MAX TITAN™ system will redefine the helicopter external lift market by increasing future mission capabilities in any location and any type of weather.

Unmanned aviation follows the path of manned. At the beginning of the XX century, first, there were reconnaissance airplanes, then they learned to drop bombs from them. We fought the first planes initially from the ground with machine-gun and artillery fire, it turned out to be expensive and inefficient. Until specialized fighter planes appeared. History repeats itself with unmanned aircraft. Shooting down drones with missiles or cannons is also expensive and also inefficient. It was clear that soon the reconnaissance and strike drones would be hunted by unmanned fighters. The first such device was presented by the Russian company ZALA DEFENSE.

Updating mobile networks is quite a difficult job, which is usually performed by engineers. But Vodafone decided to introduce an innovation in England and, together with Ericsson, try to replace people with drones in this business.

The Chinese company Xiaopeng Motors, specializing in the production of electric vehicles, presented a manned drone Traveler X1 at the Shanghai Auto Show Auto Shanghai 2021. Traveler X1 is capable of reaching speeds of up to 120 km/h. The size of the new vehicle is comparable to the size of a compact city car.

The State Duma adopted in the first reading a government bill providing for the introduction of accounting identification marks, which will be required to be applied to unmanned civil aircraft.

Starting next year, the unmanned aircraft will begin parachuting mail and medical supplies weighing up to 200 kilograms in such remote regions as Kamchatka and the Komi Republic.

The UAE-based company ADASI, a subdivision of EDGE, has designed and developed the QX-4, a new generation of UAV loitering munitions able to carry up to two precision-guided bombs. The drone was unveiled during IDEX 2021, International Land Defense Exhibition that was held in Abu Dhabi, February 2021.

On April 13, the first domestic unmanned aerial system with a hybrid powerplant, the ZALA 421 - 16E5G, was presented.