Wake-Up Call for Stealth Technology

In a development that could have a phenomenal effect on the use of stealth aircraft in military situations, Roke Manor Research (RMR), a U.K.-based contract research and development business owned by Siemens, has announced that by using one of its sensor technologies in conjunction with existing mobile phone base station networks, stealthy aircraft can be readily detected.

Many countries are spending heavily on the design of stealthy aircraft. However, engineers at RMR have discovered that by simply utilizing the signals routinely transmitted by mobile phone base stations, their sophisticated sensing technology can detect and accurately plot the positions of all aircraft in an area, including those designed to be stealthy.

Peter Lloyd, a research scientist at Roke Manor Research, explained that the mobile telephone base stations now in use would not have to be altered at all. “If aircraft are flying over the area, signals that the base stations are sending into the air will be scattered on contact with the craft in such a way that our radar signature analysis sensing equipment would detect their presence,” he said.