Defense tech company Anduril showed off a new way to keep watch over the battlefield during the Northern Strike military exercise, deploying two passive sensor systems that spot threats without ever revealing their own presence. Wisp and the Long-Range Camera Tower both track targets purely through infrared imaging and electro-optical sensing, meaning they emit no signals of their own and give an adversary nothing to detect or jam in return. During the exercise, the pair successfully picked out small drones, large fixed-wing aircraft, and surface vessels from a distance, all without lighting up on radar warning systems the way active sensors typically do. Footage from the demonstration shows the equipment operating in coastal and field settings, quietly tracking multiple airborne and maritime targets at once.

The standout performer is Wisp, which delivers full 360-degree hemispheric awareness and can reportedly detect small drones out to 20 kilometers, helicopters out to 70 kilometers, and commercial-sized aircraft as far as 150 kilometers away. Because the system relies entirely on passive infrared and optical tracking rather than emitting radar or radio signals, it is effectively immune to jamming and far harder for an enemy to locate and target in return. That combination of long range and stealth is increasingly valuable as drone threats multiply and adversaries get better at detecting and disabling active sensors. With this Northern Strike demonstration, Anduril is positioning Wisp and the Camera Tower as a quiet but far-reaching layer of air defense for both military and homeland security use.