'uav' is a correct and usable word in written English, short for 'unmanned aerial vehicle.' You can use it in any context when referring to unmanned aerial vehicles, such as in the following sentence: "The government is researching the potential of uavs in delivering mail and emergency supplies."
I also told them that I was not particularly up-to-date with defence procurement matters and in particular had no idea whether the MoD had already contracted to acquire such a mini UAV".
Nobody knows when a civilian UAV industry will take off.
And as with all new technologies, unmanned vehicles will have uses that have not yet been imagined.Already, the technology is so easily available that you can build a basic UAV for around $1,000 from model-aircraft parts, the innards of a GPS unit and a Lego Mindstorms robotics kit just as Chris Anderson has done.
Earlier this year British bobbies used one to keep an eye on a music festival, busting people for drug offences and catching others breaking into cars.The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, which operates more than a dozen helicopters, has experimented with a foldaway UAV.
Smaller, lighter and simpler UAV reconnaissance systems are being developed for troops in the field.
A reconnaissance UAV known as Red Wagon did not fare well, and funding went instead into a fast, high-altitude plane that later became known as the SR-71 Blackbird, and the first Corona surveillance satellites.But America's air force continued to experiment, converting a small jet-powered target drone, the Firebee, into an unmanned spy plane called the Lightning Bug.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Army promoted the development of a similar but still larger UAV, the Israeli-designed RQ-5 Hunter, which had a gross weight of 1,600 pounds (720 kg) and was propelled by both pusher and tractor propellers.
The most important UAV in operational use is the General Atomics MQ-1 Predator, powered by a piston engine driving a pusher propeller.
A solar-powered unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) built by British defense-technology company QinetiQ quadrupled the previous record for the longest unmanned flight, set in 2008.
In April 2006 a UAV used by US Customs and Border Protection crashed in Arizona when its engine was accidentally turned off by the team piloting it.
Modern unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are a cheap way to reach high altitude (though "high" is a relative term; a UAV can manage 40km, not 500km).
