See a heavy attack drone that carries a ton of weapons

Baykar Makina began designing Akinci in mid-2018, and by the beginning of 2019 began its development.

The drone is equipped with turbodiesel engines,The power of each is 450 horsepower. The maximum take-off weight of the UAV is 4.5 tons, and the wingspan is 20 meters. Akinci can carry 1.3 tons of payload.

The drone received missiles of the classair-to-surface MAM, guided bombs and SOM cruise missiles with a range of more than 250 kilometers. Turkish engineers will equip Akinci with an active phased array radar, electronic warfare systems and satellite communications equipment for control and transmission of intelligence information.

Initially, the developers expected thatThe drone will be able to stay in the air for up to 24 hours. Tests exceeded expectations: Akinci spent 25 hours and 26 minutes in flight with a load of 1.36 tons. It covered 7.5 thousand km and broke the Turkish national aviation record for flight altitude, rising to 11,582 m. The wingspan of the drone is 20 meters - this makes it one of the largest Turkish drones currently being produced. In Turkish Akinci means "Raider".

The drone has already been handed over to the Armed ForcesTurkey (TAF) at a ceremony attended by President Recep Erdogan. According to him, Turkey's latest drone is taking the country's defense industry to the top league - "among the three leading manufacturers of combat drones in the world."

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