Baby Blimp Boosts Big Brothers

A model unmanned airship on stand A1102 gives a small scale indication of the surveillance aerostats offered by Telephonics Corp. for a range of civil and military applications. Launched from a landborne trailer or from the stern platform of a ship, the tethered blimps provide coverage from self-contained, mobile platforms. They are already in service with the US and other governments. Smallest of the range, the TCOM 15M is deployable in less than two hours and carries a 150-pound underslung payload to a height of 1,000 feet, where it can remain on station for up to five days.

Scaled up in size are the 32M and 71M, the latter flying up to 20,000 feet and remaining aloft for 30 days. Typical payloads include a rotating radar scanner, fixed phased-array radar, communications dishes and signals intelligence antennas. (©Mike Vines)