Black Recon

Black Recon is Teledyne FLIR's vehicle-launched autonomous micro-drone system, built so a crew can launch, recover and recharge up to three small reconnaissance UAVs without ever leaving their vehicle.

Overview

Black Recon is a vehicle- or installation-mounted reconnaissance system from Teledyne FLIR Defense that automates the full life cycle of a small drone — launch, flight, recovery, docking and recharging — all managed from inside the host platform. Teledyne FLIR Defense (the defense arm of Teledyne Technologies, NYSE: TDY, with a US base in Wilsonville, Oregon and an unmanned-systems unit rooted in Norway) announced the market launch at the Eurosatory 2026 land-warfare show in Paris on 15 June 2026. Each system carries three micro-UAVs under 450 grams apiece that cycle in rotation — one overhead, one recharging, one waiting in the launcher — giving what the company calls near-continuous, 24/7 overwatch.

The organizing idea is that a small reconnaissance team should never have to stop, dismount and hand-fly a drone in exposed terrain. An operator inside the vehicle launches a UAV with a button press; it flies a reconnaissance, surveillance and target-acquisition (RSTA) task, then returns to a hardened box where a robotic cradle plucks it from the air, docks it and recharges it. Teledyne FLIR positions Black Recon one tier above its pocket-sized Black Hornet nano-UAV — the vehicle-level layer of the same reconnaissance stack, flown from a common controller. It is offered for order now, with first deliveries expected in 2027.

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