Nichols Martin
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency used Echodyne-made radars during a drone surveillance test last month.
The company said Friday its EchoGuard and EchoFlight radars detected and differentiated small drones from other objects, such as buildings and birds, within the area under the Aerial Dragnet program.
The radars operated from tower-mounted spots and aerostat balloons that flew at a maximum altitude of 400 feet in San Diego and National City, Calif.
The exercise demonstrated the radars’ capacity to detect more than 150 drone sorties. The deployments included commercially available drones.
The University of Washington's Applied Physics Laboratory supported the effort.
The DARPA-led Aerial Dragnet program seeks to address the need for urban drone detection as the number of unmanned aerial systems in U.S. airspace is projected to rise.
