RavnX

RavnX from America, produced by Aevum Space

Introduce:

World’s Biggest Drone RavnX: A 28-Ton Autonomous Drone

The RavnX is unveiled by Alabama rocket start-up Aevum and would soon be used to rocket US military satellites into orbit.
Rocket launch start-up Aevum recently unveiled the biggest drone in the world. The drone is named RavnX and is an entirely autonomous vehicle 80 feet long, has a 60-feet wingspan, and is 18-feet tall. The drone wins significantly in terms of mass, weighing 55,000 pounds when the rocket is added to it.

The UAS is also the only small launch vehicle built as reusable, making up for a 70% reusability of the complete system. It is expected to be up to 95% reusable in the future.

Aevum unveiled the AuLV from its hangar at Cecil airport in Jacksonville, Florida, US, in December 2020. The first launch with the US Space Force and ASLON-45 mission is expected to take place in late-2021.

The autonomous launch paradigm becomes advantageous for industries such as logistics, intelligence, defence, e-commerce, advanced analytics, climate change, weather monitoring, and agriculture.

Ravn X will have a length of 80ft, a wingspan of 60ft, the height of 18ft and gross take-off weight of 55,000lb. A maximum of six people is required to launch the vehicle into space.

The UAS delivers its payloads to the lower Earth orbit and returns to the Earth by autonomously landing safely on the runway and parks itself in the hangar.

The launch sequence will involve three stages, of which the first stage is completely autonomous and reusable. The second and third stages will be the rocket stages that are powered by the same engine. All three stages will use Jet A fuel, which is also used by commercial airliners.

The autonomous vehicle can be launched from a 1m-long runway and an 8,000ft² hangar for satellite lift operations.