The Lockheed Martin Polecat (company designation P-175) was an

unmanned aerial vehicle An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) or unmanned aircraft system (UAS), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft with no human pilot, crew, or passengers onboard, but rather is controlled remotely or is autonomous.De Gruyter Handbook of Dron ...

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 ...

. It was developed by the company's Advanced Development Programs division in

Palmdale Palmdale is a city in northern Los Angeles County, California, United States. The city lies in the Antelope Valley of Southern California. The San Gabriel Mountains separate Palmdale from the Los Angeles Basin to the south. On August 24, 1962 ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

Design and development

Designated P-175, the Polecat was funded internally by Lockheed Martin (as opposed to using

United States Government The Federal Government of the United States of America (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the Federation#Federal governments, national government of the United States. The U.S. federal government is composed of three distinct ...

funds) at the beginning of 2005. The prototype was unveiled at the 2006

Farnborough Airshow The Farnborough International Airshow is a trade exhibition for the aerospace and defence industries, where civilian and military aircraft are demonstrated to potential customers and investors in Farnborough, Hampshire. Since its first show in ...

.Farnborough picture: Lockheed Martin Skunk Works releases picture of secret Polecat UAV
" ''

Flight International ''Flight International'', formerly ''Flight'', is a monthly magazine focused on aerospace. Published in the United Kingdom and founded in 1909 as "A Journal devoted to the Interests, Practice, and Progress of Aerial Locomotion and Transport", i ...

''. July 19, 2006. Retrieved July 12, 2013Aviation Week ShowNews Farnborough Day 4 E-zine
." ''

Aviation Week & Space Technology ''Aviation Week & Space Technology'', often abbreviated ''Aviation Week'' or ''AW&ST'', is the flagship magazine of the Aviation Week Network, a division of Informa. The weekly magazine is available in print and online, reporting on the aeros ...

''. July 20, 2006. It was developed over a period of 18 months.Butler, A.
Lockheed Unveils Secret Polecat UAV Design
" ''Aviation Week & Space Technology''. July 19, 2006. On December 18, 2006, the aircraft crashed due to an "irreversible unintentional failure in the flight termination ground equipment, which caused the aircraft's automatic fail-safe flight termination mode to activate."Trimble, S.

" ''Flightglobal.com''. July, 2007.

Specifications

References

{{Lockheed aircraft

Polecat Polecat is a common name for several mustelid species in the order Carnivora and subfamilies Ictonychinae and Mustelinae. Polecats do not form a single taxonomic rank (i.e. clade). The name is applied to several species with broad similarities t ...

2000s United States experimental aircraft Unmanned military aircraft of the United States Twinjets Flying wings Unmanned stealth aircraft Aircraft with retractable tricycle landing gear Aircraft first flown in 2005