Developed and manufactured by Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI), the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) ANKA has resumed operations after being fitted with a new Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR).

The ANKA, which will be deployed in the Aegean and the Mediterranean with its SAR and camera load in the sea for surface reconnaissance and surveillance missions, will be able to gather intelligence from a distant range and over the clouds with its new radar.

The system will also be able to identify and pinpoint positions of surface elements. With the imaging modes, intelligence can be gathered from strategic targets such as ports and base areas. With the search modes, on the other hand, the speed and location of moving targets will be detected.

ANKA entered the Turkish military's inventory in 2016 following the successful testing of its prototype in 2013. As ANKA's configuration has varied in the meantime, the system has been further developed with a number of changes in line with the needs of the security forces.

While nearly 20 ANKAs are currently used by security forces in various configurations, these UAVs have already surpassed 15,000 hours in flight time.

ANKAs have been used successfully in recent operations and intensive warfare conditions such as signal jamming.

The reconnaissance and surveillance capabilities of the ANKA, which have been equipped with new useful loads in line with the new requirements, are being strengthened and developed to cover a larger area.

ASELSAN completed the serial production of the SARPER SAR System, imaging and moving target detection radar developed for the aerial platforms, and delivered it to TAI. One of these systems was integrated into the ANKA, and flight tests were carried out in this scope.

SARPER can be used on manned and unmanned aerial platforms for high-resolution terrain imaging and moving target detection.

In aerial surveillance applications, SAR sensors provide significant gains with their imaging ability even in rainy/cloudy and dark weather. The SARPER system presents the most accurate resolution to the extent allowed by the physical constraints.

Thanks to its special antenna design and signal processing approaches, the system is also capable of imaging and moving target detection via the same antenna.

Used for reconnaissance and surveillance purposes in the military field, SARPER can serve in damage detection and crisis management after a natural disaster, urban planning and cartography applications in the civil area. Meanwhile, SARPER can fly up to 30,000 feet.