Turkish Land Forces Command inducts Baha VTOL unmanned aircraft

An artist's impression of the Baha unmanned aircraft in service with the Turkish army. (Havelsan)

Turkish Land Forces Command has inducted into service the new Havelsan Baha vertical-take-off and landing (VTOL) unmanned aircraft system (UAS).

Announced by the Turkish Ministry of National Defense on 25 April,the milestone has seen an undisclosed number of UASs formally received into the inventory of the Turkish Armed Forces.

News of the induction came three years after Türkiye's domestically developed Baha UAS was first showcased at the Africa Aerospace and Defence (AAD) 2022 event in South Africa. It was billed at that time as being a small unmanned aircraft developed to conduct intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) missions with the ability to perform as an independent platform and in alliance with other manned and unmanned air and ground assets.

The 4 m-wingspan Baha features a boom-mounted inverted V-tail, with four electrically driven propellers for VTOL flight and one electrically driven pusher-propeller for forward flight. Performance specifications released by Havelsan give the Baha a maximum take-off weight (MTOW)of 28 kg (including a 2 kg payload), a datalink range of 50 km, an endurance of 2 h, a service ceiling of 10,000 ft (with an operational altitude of 8,000 ft), a wind limit of 25 kt, and an operating temperature range of -10 °C to +50 °C.

For more information on the Baha UAS, please see AAD 2022: Havelsan exhibits indigenously designed autonomous Baha UAV .