DRDO conducts maiden test-flight of Panchi

Panchi, the wheeled version of the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) Nishant, capable of taking off from and landing on small airstrips, had its maiden flight on December 24 from an airfield at Kolar in Karnataka.The aim of the flight, which lasted 25 minutes, was “to demonstrate that Panchi can take off and land on its wheels. It was a textbook flight,” said Anil Kumar Agarwal, Project Director, Panchi. The flight was preceded by high-speed taxi trials that began at the Kolar airfield on November 22.Panchi was designed and developed by the Aeronautical Development Establishment (ADE), a Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) facility at Bengaluru.