下一代的顶级枪支可能是游戏玩家的怪胎。那是因为X-47B只是拿它的第一次飞行，预示着一个全新的军事飞行 - 自动或偏远，隐形，致命的战斗飞机的时代。
技术nically the X-47B is an unmanned combat air vehicle (UCAV), but what it really is is an evolution of those Global Hawk and Predator drone aircraft that made the Iraq War look like a computer game when viewed at the military’s tech hubs, mixed in with the same kind of stealth technology that makes the B-2 Spirit bomber such a powerful, frightening tool of force projection.
X-47B是从数十年的飞行翼研究中借用的，是一种光滑的发动机和电子产品的飞行楔，几乎看不见雷达，并且很难用红外导弹锁定。It’s capable of taking off automatically, flying to a location by itself, scanning the scene with a variety of sensors, and then–when commanded to do so by remote pilots–dropping precision-guided weapons on a target, before flying home to an air base or an aircraft carrier.
本质上，这是革命者的第一个继任者F-35，在F-35之前以原型为原型，甚至可以使用，因为X-47B可能是未来军用飞机的典范，这是由于一个重要的事实：不再需要脆弱的人类飞行员。During combat, the loss of a military aircraft is a technological and fiscal blow, but the loss of a pilot is far worse–personally it’s a loss, politically it’s terrible, and financially it’s a disaster, since pilots cost millions of dollars to train and keep flight-ready. Human pilots also require life support systems in aircraft, which increases their weight, and limits their flight envelope–without the pilot aboard, an X-47B-type aircraft could theoretically perform all sorts of crazy aerobatic maneuvers that a human pilot couldn’t withstand.
正是诺斯罗普（Northrop）现在将要通过进一步的飞行测试来探索这一勇敢的新飞行未来，并在航空公司陆地上达到了最终。查看下面的第一个飞行视频，您可能希望在心理上演唱主题曲调壮志凌云。因为将来，这种飞机内部的数字大脑将接管Maverick和Ice Man。
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