US Predator Drones Log Over 6 Million Flight Hours

General Atomics’ Predator series of Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) which includes the Predator, Predator B, Gray Eagle, Avenger and MQ-9B SkyGuardian lines, surpassed six million flight hours on October 31.

The aircraft completed 430,495 total missions with close to 90% of those missions flown in combat, the company said in a statement on Monday.

The identification of the specific aircraft and customer that achieved the milestone is unknown as every second of every day, 69 Predator-class Medium-altitude, Long-endurance (MALE) RPA are airborne throughout the world, the company claimed.

The drones average more than 60,000 hours per month supporting the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, NASA, the Italian Air Force, the Royal Air Force, the French Air Force, the UAE Armed Forces, and other customers.