According to the official WeChat account of China’s Haiying Aviation General Equipment Co., Ltd. on January 11, WJ-700 Falcon UAV completed its first flight experiment on the morning of the 11th, and various technical indicators reached the international advanced level.
Data shows that the WJ-700 high-altitude, high-speed, surveillance and combat UAV system adopts wheeled autonomous take-off and landing, can be loaded with a variety of mission equipment and airborne weapons, can perform opposite (sea/ground) reconnaissance, surveillance, early warning tasks, and perform remote anti-ship, anti-radiation and ground-to-ground precision strike missions outside the defense zone, perform electronic reconnaissance and jamming missions, with a maximum take-off weight of 3,500KG and a maximum flight time of 20 hours.
When WJ-700 (also known as Lieyin or Falcon) was publicly displayed at the 12th China Air Show, Ma Hongzhong, director of the 302 Institute of the Third Academy of Aerospace Science and Technology of China, said in an interview: “You may see that this UAV is somewhat similar to the appearance of most UAVs now, but the biggest difference between it and other UAVs is that it is a high-altitude, high-speed, long-endurance UAV.”
“This kind of high-altitude and high-speed flight greatly improves the penetration and survivability of this drone in the future battlefield.” Ma Hongzhong explained that thanks to the jet engines used, WJ-700 UAV can reach an ultimate speed of 700 kilometers per hour (much greater than the MQ-9’s 299.50 mph) and its flight altitude is capable of reaching more than 12,000 meters.
Furthermore, WJ-700 UAV can use CM-102 anti-radiation missiles for anti-radiation operations, which are also part of the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC), and most of its performance exceeds that of the U.S. HARM missile.
From public data, the CM-102 missile has a range of 100 kilometers and a combat weight of 80 kilograms, and its guidance head operates in the 2-18 GHz range, which covers almost all the frequencies used by most guidance and guidance radars.