IAI Searcher I
Country: 
IsraelManufacturer: Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI)
Tactical successor to Scout and Mastiff: multi-mission UAV for reconnaissance, surveillance and fire correction, the technological foundation of the Heron family.
Tactical successor to Scout and Mastiff: multi-mission UAV for reconnaissance, surveillance and fire correction, the technological foundation of the Heron family.
Community
Data trust
- Reliability
- Unverified
- Sources
- Sources pending review
Identity
- Designation
- IAI Searcher I
- Alias
- Meyromit
- Manufacturer
- Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI)
- Country
- Israel
- Year
- 1992
- Category
- ISR (Reconnaissance)
- Class
- Tactical (< 600 kg)
- Status
- Historic
Performance
- Range
- 120 km
- Endurance
- 14 h
- Top speed
- 200 km/h
- Service ceiling
- 4,600 m
- Propulsion
- Pistone 4T, 47 hp, elica spintore
Physical characteristics
- MTOW
- 372 kg
- Payload
- 63 kg
Onboard systems
- Sensors
- Gimbal EO/IR POP-200, opzionale SAR
- Datalink / control
- Datalink LOS digitale crittografato
- Launch
- Pista o catapulta
- Recovery
- Pista (carrello fisso)
Combat use
- ▸Indian counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir
- ▸Sri Lankan border surveillance during the civil war
- ▸Russian Forpost in Syria (2015-) and Ukraine (2022-)
Tags
Main operators
History
Developed in the early 1990s to replace the Scout and Mastiff, the Searcher I doubled endurance, added a heavier sensor payload and a digital encrypted datalink.
Searcher II (1998) and Searcher Mk III (2014) further extended endurance and range. A licensed Russian variant is known as the Forpost.
The IAI Searcher was designed in the 1990s to consolidate the lessons of Scout and Mastiff in a single airframe, introducing for the first time on an Israeli tactical drone the encrypted digital datalink and automatic take-off/landing, capabilities that are industry standard today.
The Searcher Mk II (1998) was exported in volume to India, equipping the Army, Navy and Air Force for surveillance along the Pakistan border and counter-insurgency operations in Kashmir.
A Russian licence-built variant named Forpost has been operated in Syria and Ukraine since 2015, showing how Israeli UAV technology has also influenced programs in countries not aligned with the West.