The GAF Turana was a

target drone A target drone is an unmanned aerial vehicle, generally remote controlled, usually used in the training of anti-aircraft crews. One of the earliest drones was the British DH.82 Queen Bee, a variant of the Tiger Moth trainer aircraft operationa ...

produced by the

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Government Aircraft Factories Government Aircraft Factories (GAF) was the name of an aircraft manufacturer owned by the Government of Australia. The primary factory was located at Fishermans Bend, a suburb of Melbourne in Victoria. It had its origins in the lead-up to World ...

(GAF). The name is believed to be from an

Aboriginal Australian Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Islands ...

word meaning ''rainbow''. The Turana target drone was designed and built in Australia as a development of the

Ikara Ikara is a town in Kaduna State, northern Nigeria, located around 75 kilometres north-east away from the city of Zaria. Ikara as a district consist of five towns which are Ikara, Tudun - wada, Nasarawa, Sabon - Gari, Jamfalan, Kurmin - Kogi, Hay ...

anti-submarine weapon system. It was a target drone with remote control that was launched from the Ikara launcher for use in naval anti-aircraft target practice.

Design and development

The Turana had a composite metal/fibre glass structure and was powered by a

Microturbo Cougar 022 Safran Helicopter Engines, previously known as Turbomeca, is a French manufacturer of low- and medium-power gas turbine turboshaft engines for helicopters. The company also produces gas turbine engines for aircraft and missiles, as well as turbin ...

Turbojet. The Turana was first flown from Woomera in August 1971. The program was cancelled in 1979 as water ingress during recovery of the drone was causing failure of the electronics.

Notes

References

External links

Turana target drone

Historical Aircraft Restoration Society The Historical Aircraft Restoration Society, often referred to by its acronym, HARS, is an Australian based aircraft restoration group. The group has two museums, at Shellharbour Airport in New South Wales, Australia, and Parkes, New South Wales ...

(HARS) * GAF aircraft Target drones Unmanned aerial vehicles of Australia Aircraft first flown in 1971 Single-engined jet aircraft Mid-wing aircraft {{UAV-stub

Design and development

See also

Notes

References

Further reading

External links