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Avalon 2025: Australia reimagines Ghost Bat as a proving platform and targets future versions

24th March 2025 - 10:39 GMT | by Damian Kemp in Melbourne, Australia

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The RAAF envisions following iterations of UAVs being descendants of MQ-28A Ghost Bat. (Photo: Boeing Defence Australia)

Now known as the MQ-28 Ghost Bat, the Loyal Wingman notably kept close to promised deadlines such as first flight in February 2021, in spite of originally being promised for 2020.

Boeing Defence Australia unveiled what was then referred to as the Loyal Wingman large stealthy uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) at the Australian International Airshow in Avalon near Melbourne six years ago. It occurred amid much fanfare and the trumpeting that it would be the first Australian designed military aircraft in more than six decades.

The original idea outlined for the UAV was as a multirole platform which could conceivably act as an escort or attack aircraft and while the US side of Boeing continues to look at it in this role, on the opposite side of the Pacific it is

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