Drone carrier

This article is missing information about The term "drone carrier" has also been used to refer to aircraft and land vehicles that carry deployable drones. The deployed drones themselves, can be ground, water, or aerial drones as well, not restricted to UAV/UCAV. . Please expand the article to include this information. Further details may exist on the talk page. (June 2024)

A drone carrier is a crewed or uncrewed ship equipped with a flight deck on which drones (unmanned aerial vehicles) can take off and land. This ship can be civilian or military. In addition to drone carriers for unmanned aerial Vehicles, there are also others for unmanned underwater vehicles and unmanned surface vehicles.

As a naval vessel, a drone carrier is capable of launching and picking up combat drones without the need for large and expensive aircraft carriers .

In March 2013, DARPA began efforts to develop a fleet of small naval vessels capable of launching and retrieving combat drones without the need for large and expensive aircraft carriers.^[1] In the UK the UXV Combatant, which would have been a ship dedicated to UCAVs, was proposed for the Royal Navy.^[2]

In November 2014, US DoD made an open request for ideas on how to build an airborne aircraft carrier that can launch and retrieve drones using existing military aircraft such as the B-1B, B-52 or C-130.^[3]