>>63138154
>They claim they can do up to 800lbs of payload. So... it can be armed, right? https://uasmagazine.com/articles/skydweller-aero-continues-ampa-flight-tests-with-operational-military-payloads
more likely stuff like sonobouys and sensor payloads, it'll be far too slow to actually catch drones or subs. All it really needs to do is 100kt or so to easily run down anything submersible and 99% of surface ships, or to patrol a net of picket stations. The weak link on current manned ASW patrol aircraft is the crew needing to do silly things like "sleep" and "not maintain constant vigilance for 18 fucking hours straight". With a 747's wingspan it will never really be replacing anything but land-based patrol birds anyway, so the active short-range sub patrol for a carrier will still be helos.
The other, more interesting option is as a multiplexing communications and repeater momma bird for drones, or a RADAR carrier to form secondary nodes for a distributed AWACS net with the primary (expensive, vulnerable) processing electronics on the central bird.

>>63145048
I mean the funny answer is to load it up with a half-ton of suicide FPVs of varying payload size
But for poacher's jeeps and drug subs? A FLIR and a hundred pounds or so of fragmentation grenades. With an 800-lb payload load that may not exactly be negligible, but still reasonable. You'd get something like 50 grenades with stabilizing fins and an aerial release mechanism, and you can afford to drop a cluster of them to send a polite reminder. Or just say fuck it, load up the whole payload bay with some guided mortar rounds and a laser pod if you want to go scorched-earth. Small arms won't have the range to be remote-fired with anything resembling the accuracy you'd need without the bird being vulnerable as all shit to ground fire. Again, wingspan the size of a 747.

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Can this shit be armed? It's a solar aircraft. Carbon fiber. They have a DOD R&D contract to demonstrate an "Autonomous Maritime Patrol…