Air Force Times has an interesting story. There are a ton of things to think about in what is otherwise a very short news report.An unmanned aerial vehicle crashed Sunday in Iraq, according to the Air Force.Note the cost of the aircraft. Note the reason for the crash. Note the most likely causes for communication loss.
The crash of the MQ-1 Predator, flown out of Joint Base Balad, occurred at 4:30 p.m. after an Air National Guard crew lost communications with the remote-controlled plane. The wreckage was discovered about 45 minutes later.
The crash is the second of a Predator this month. An Air Force special operations MQ-1 went down Feb. 8 in Afghanistan.
The Predator is designed to continue flying on auto-pilot if it is not able to receive directions from crew members on the ground. However, often a communications loss is the result of mechanical or electrical problems that the auto-pilot cannot handle, resulting in a crash.
An accident investigation board will look into what led to the loss of the plane, worth about $3.5 million.
Anyone know where to find good records for accident rates of the Predator? I bet it has a great flight time record based on number of hours since the aircraft actually flies a whole bunch of hours in one sortie. I would be curious to know for sure though.
This technology may still have a long way to go to replace traditional aircraft, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't stay focused on developing the future. I still say the X-47B is more important to the long term future of naval aviation than the F-35C.
The X-47B is decades away from being any sort of replacement for the F-35C, but should never be considered an optional program for carrier aviation. The learning curve for the X-47B will be very steep, best to start the journey now.
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