50 Cutting Edge Military Vehicles

TERN Program

While there are plenty of small unmanned aerial vehicles already in service, the hitch for using them on the water has been launching and retrieving them in rough seas and on small decks. DARPA’s TERN program (it stands for “Tactically Exploited Reconnaissance Node” but handily evokes a seabird) aims to fill that niche with an aircraft that can take off and land on its tail.