“My preoccupation with UAVs continued for 30 years,” Karem said.
After leaving the Israeli air force and working for a defense contractor, Karem grew frustrated at his efforts to start his own business building drones in Israel and thought he would have more success in California.
AeroVironment, a California company, designs and manufactures small military drones such as the Raven, Wasp and Puma systems. AeroVironment exhibits its drones in this promotional video. (No audio)
Details about the U.S. drone fleet.
The flight of the Albatross led Karem, with the support of DARPA, to develop the Amber drone, which was stocked with custom-built components, including a powerful flight control computer, and could be configured for surveillance or attack missions. He also developed a lower-technology, export version called the Gnat 750.
Karem’s drones were met with some skepticism. The military, he said, thought “they were skinny in shape” and unlikely to be robust enough for operations.
“Luckily for me, industry didn’t take my efforts all that seriously until Amber” proved successful, Karem said.
Karem began to scale up to full production but found himself overextended financially when the military decided not to pursue large-scale development of the Amber. Karem sold his company to Hughes Aircraft, which, in turn, sold it to General Atomics, a privately held firm that earns an estimated $600 million per year from defense contracts. Karem remained on as a consultant.
In 1993, James Woolsey, then the new director of the CIA, found himself frustrated by the intelligence from satellites flying over Bosnia. He had known Karem for several years and turned to General Atomics and Karem for a vehicle that could provide what drone builders call a “persistent stare.” Pentagon experts had said it would take years and many millions to develop a prototype.
The Gnat 750, operated from an abandoned airfield in Albania, first flew over Bosnia in February 1994.
“I could sit in my office, call up a classified channel and in an early version of e-mail type messages to a guy in Albania asking him to zoom in on things,” Woolsey said.
The data had a long way to go to reach Woolsey. It was relayed from the Gnat to a manned aircraft and then to the ground station and then to a satellite and from there to CIA headquarters in Langley.
To streamline the process, and fit in a satellite communications system, General Atomics enlarged the airframe and added a bulbous nose to the Gnat’s fuselage.
The Predator A was born. It first flew in July 1994.
By then, Karem had moved on. He later helped develop a drone helicopter, the A160 Hummingbird, a venture that was acquired by Boeing in 2004.
He has abandoned drones to pursue a new dream at his offices in Lake Forest: A Boeing 737-size passenger plane capable of taking off vertically and landing like a helicopter. Such an advance, Karem said, would scupper the need for high-speed rail and allow planes to commute between the downtowns of different cities.
Karem calls it an “aerotrain,” and the 74-year-old wants it built before he retires.
“I never fail,” he said.
Staff researcher Julie Tate contributed to this report.
The Post MostMost-viewed stories, videos, and galleries in the past two hours
Live Q&A, Tuesday Noon ET
Gene Weingarten takes polls and chats about his recent columns.
| 11:00 AM | ComPost Live with Alexandra Petri |
|---|---|
| 12:00 PM | Chatological Humor: Monthly with Moron |
| 1:00 PM | Advice from Slate's 'Dear Prudence' |
| 1:00 PM | Eugene Robinson Live |
Loading...
Comments