The Autonomous Rotorcraft Sniper System (ARSS) was an experimental robotic weapons system that was in development by the U.S. Army since 2005, but no information about the status of the system has been made public since 2010. The ARSS consisted of a remotely operated

sniper rifle A sniper rifle is a high-precision, long range shooting, long-range rifle. Requirements include high accuracy, reliability, mobility, concealment, and optics, for anti-personnel weapon, anti-personnel, anti-materiel rifle, anti-materiel and sur ...

attached to an unmanned autonomous helicopter. It was intended for use in urban combat or for several other missions requiring

sniper A sniper is a military or paramilitary marksman who engages targets from positions of concealment or at distances exceeding the target's detection capabilities. Snipers generally have specialized training and are equipped with telescopic si ...

s. Flight tests were scheduled to begin in Summer 2009. The rifle, a semiautomatic RND Manufacturing Edge 2000 firing the .338 Lapua Magnum cartridge, was mounted on a stabilized platform, which was attached to the underside of a Vigilante 502 UAV. The helicopter was to be flown by an autopilot while a human controller aims and fires the rifle, which may fire up to ten well-aimed shots per minute. The rifle platform, called the ''Precision Weapons Platform'' (PWP), was designed by

Utah State University Utah State University (USU or Utah State) is a public university, public land grant colleges, land-grant research university with its main campus in Logan, Utah, United States. Founded in 1888 under the Morrill Land-Grant Acts as Utah's federal ...

’s

Space Dynamics Laboratory Space Dynamics Laboratory (SDL) is a nonprofit government contractor owned by Utah State University. SDL is the sole University Affiliated Research Center (UARC) for the United States Missile Defense Agency; and, is one of 15 UARCs in the nati ...

and was equipped with a

situational awareness Situational awareness or situation awareness, often abbreviated as SA is the understanding of an environment, its elements, and how it changes with respect to time or other factors. It is also defined as the perception of the elements in the envi ...

camera and a two-level zoom scope. The system as a whole was being developed under the Army's

Aviation Applied Technology Directorate The United States Army Aviation Applied Technology Directorate (AATD) is a tenant activity located at Fort Eustis, Virginia. It is a directorate of the Aviation Development Directorate under the United States Army Aviation and Missile Research, D ...

in the course of its ''Aerial Delivery of Effects from Lightweight Aircraft'' (ADELA) program. It used much commercial off–the–shelf hardware to reduce cost and development time. For instance, the system was controlled using an Xbox 360 video game controller. Other weapons considered for use with the ARSS included the M249 or M240 machine guns, the AA-12 shotgun or

non-lethal weapons Non-lethal weapons, also called nonlethal weapons, less-lethal weapons, less-than-lethal weapons, non-deadly weapons, compliance weapons, or pain-inducing weapons are weapons intended to be lethality, less likely to kill a living target than c ...

. The ARSS hardware could also be installed on fixed-wing UAVs or ground combat robots. The

Lockheed Martin The Lockheed Martin Corporation is an American Arms industry, defense and aerospace manufacturer with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta on March 15, 1995. It is headquartered in North ...

One Shot sniper system was being considered for addition to ARSS.McHale, John
Laser-based sniper system ordered by DARPA from Lockheed Martin
''Military AeroSpace'' 18 December 2010. Accessed: 19 February 2011.

References

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External links

ARSS website at the Space Dynamics Laboratory

4MB brochure
Airborne military robots