BN Defender 4000: Unrivalled Aerial Surveillance

The Defender 4000’s low-speed handling and manoeuvring capabilities enable it to excel in the aerial surveillance role. With extended loiter and low-noise signature, it's the aircraft of choice for covert operations.

Multi-Mission Aircraft

AvBuyer | 18th April 2019

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Britten-Norman Defender 4000 flies over London

Incorporating the latest product innovations, the Defender 4000’s low-speed handling and manoeuvring capabilities enable it to excel in the aerial surveillance role. With its extended loiter and low-noise signature, it is the aircraft of choice for covert operations. Learn more...

The Defender’s prime roles include military intelligence, counter-terrorism, surveillance, reconnaissance, maritime patrol and special missions.

Flight Deck

The Defender doesn’t have a simple cockpit – it has a sophisticated flight deck. Equipped with either the Garmin or Universal glass cockpit architecture, the aircraft offers a full PFD, MFD and FMS suite with integrated autopilot, options for iPad and electronic flight bag, and further enhancements including NVG compatibility.

The real secret of the aircraft’s success is the ability to integrate information from the mission systems and operators into the panel, thereby reducing in-aircraft “chatter” and increasing mission effectiveness.

Combined with the aircraft’s ability to fly preconfigured, coupled search patterns, the Defender allows significantly enhanced crew situational awareness.

Standard avionics fit is a Garmin G600 series with GTN, KFC325 autopilot, and FMS. Options include Universal avionics all-glass cockpit; NVG compatibility; Weather radar, Satcom; UHF; Mission repeaters; and a Master Armament and Defensive Aids Suite.

Primary Missions

Maritime Patrol: Configured with the latest in 360-degree surface search radar and one of a number of available vessel monitoring systems, the Defender MPA is particularly suited to asset management (including fisheries and oil field protection), anti-piracy, counter-narcotics and maritime counter-terrorism.

The aircraft is capable of relaying real-time imagery and intelligence and storing images and data in evidential format for subsequent prosecution of offenders.

Aerial Mapping: The Defender was designed to be modified quickly and cost effectively. Integral to the aircraft design is the ability to create large floor apertures to mount equipment. These apertures can accommodate a wide range of cameras for aerial mapping and intelligence operations.

Britten-Norman aircraft offer commercial mapping organizations an ideal platform for mounting small/large format cameras, lidar systems and other types of sensors especially where low-altitude, slow flying is required.

With the option for single or dual floor hatch, the aircraft can accommodate any type of sensor and its associated accessories.

Special Mission: The Defender has been developed to support a wide range of additional special missions ranging from parachuting to crop spraying and medevac to bathymetry.

Counter Terrorism: The UK has some of the most advanced capabilities in Counter Terrorism and much of this was developed with the Defender.

While the Defender is largely unrivalled by any other aircraft (fixed wing or rotary) in both law enforcement and counter terrorism, the aircraft has a unique position in carrying out these roles in the] urban environment due to its unrivalled low speed handling characteristics.

Employed at a stand-off range, the aircraft can maintain covert status in a virtually geostationary position due to its extremely tight surveillance orbit.

Proven Force-Multiplier for Police Worldwide

Policing for many countries has become increasingly demanding for many different reasons, including changing crime patterns; organised criminal enterprises operating at local, national and international levels; terrorism; as well as budgetary constraints.

Helicopters are normally the first aircraft considered for allowing quick responses to incidents such as vehicle and offender pursuits, missing persons and public order situations. However, police use of helicopters may have limitations, such as short endurance, non-IFR and a distinct noise signature that may alert criminal suspects of an approaching aircraft.

To mitigate these limitations, police services globally choose to operate fixed-wing aircraft. The Britten-Norman Defender is seen as a highly versatile, low cost, all weather option. The Defender, while equipped with complex surveillance technology, also has the capacity to carry crew-specialist staff such as forensic officers to remote locations and land on non-hardened airstrips.

For Police forces with large territorial areas of responsibility and with limited conventional aviation infrastructure, for example in Africa, and in Central and South America, the use of a Defender enhances a Police service’s ability to deliver specialist support consistent with today’s operating environment.

The primary and long-proven use of the Defender relates to operations aimed at confronting crime, with its proven ability to detect crime live, “in action” as offences happen.

With modern surveillance cameras, the Defender operates at heights above those normally flown by helicopters and, by doing so, enables the systems operators to observe suspicious activity on the ground without criminal suspects knowing an aircraft is presence.

A good example of this is detecting a hard-to-catch burglar who commits crime overnight in quiet residential or commercial areas with little likelihood of otherwise being detected.

The Defender crew would detect and then monitor suspicious activity and then quietly direct ground officers into the relevant area to make an arrest. This allows police commanders to make better use of their patrol resources whilst the aircraft quietly conducts the search for serial offenders.

Further to this, the Defender aircraft’s significant ability to support operations that target sophisticated serious and organised crime enterprises, including large scale narcotic supply, armed crime, anti-terrorism and people smuggling. The Defender also undertakes many conventional helicopter tasks including monitoring public order events, such as football matches and demonstrations, along with missing persons and offender searches.

Police services consider the varied operating capability of the Defender to be a significant force multiplier in both conventional and nonconventional policing operations.

More information from www.britten-norman.com