Posted on 02/10/2017 4:35:46 AM PST by SandRat
FORT HUACHUCA - The Shadow RQ-7Bv2 unmanned aircraft which lost connectivity with the ground station here Jan. 31 was found today by a hiker in the mountains west of Evergreen, Colorado.
No one was injured, but the aircraft has sustained damage.
Soldiers from Fort Carson, Colorado, along with Clear Creek County and Jefferson County, Colorado, Sheriff Departments are currently assisting with security and recovery efforts.
Search efforts were aided by the National Radar Forensics Team at 1st Air Force's Air Force Rescue Coordination Center at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida, which specializes in tracking lost and/or downed aircraft. The team was able to reconstruct the aircraft's flight profile from start to finish by leveraging data from multiple radar returns simultaneously determining course and approximate airspeed and altitude.
The unmanned aircraft was part of a training mission being conducted at Fort Huachuca by the 14th Brigade Engineer Battalion of the 2-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 7th Infantry Division, from Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.
The Shadow RQ-7Bv2 is a rapidly deployable, short-range airborne reconnaissance system designed to give the battlefield commander a day/night, multi-sensor collection system. The aircraft has an endurance of eight to nine hours and can fly a distance of 125 kilometers. It weighs 450 pounds, has a wingspan of 20 feet and a fuel capacity of 58 liters. he Shadow has an estimated value of $1.5 million.
An investigation to determine why the Shadow lost connectivity with its ground station continues.
Journalists are stupid. The "how" is that it flew there.
The military wants to know the "why", not the "how".
Bob, it was launched from Fort Huachuca. There was a thread here when the original story came out.
It would have been nice to include that information in this article. I doubt that many people keep particularly close tabs on Army drone launches.
There was enough information in the posted article to infer that it was launch from the location of the training exercise.
One of the early scenes in “Interstellar” comes to mind...
Funny,.... at first first seeing that image, I was thinking UFO, instead of the cited uav that was cited.
The stated 125 km range of the drone and its 1000+ km recovery distance from Huachuca certainly wouldn’t lead me to infer an AZ launch.
Well, OK. You have a nice day.
Are you sure about that? According to the article/s it doesn’t have the radio range or the flight range to fly 1,200 kilometers.
One picture of the drone shows it to be grey. How does it change colors in flight or, at all? Spell check is not your friend...The word just looks wrong when proof reading.
Maximum speed: 127 mph; 204 km/h (110 kn)
Cruising speed: 81 mph; 130 km/h
Endurance: 6 h/ 9 h Increased Endurance
It posed a threat to other air traffic, especially if it is poorly spotted by collision avoidance systems. Could have climbed easily to 18,000 service ceiling.
C-130 midair collision on approach to landing FOB Sharana resulted in loss of two engines and wing damage in 2011. Not an RC model by this result.
The article and Wiki say the radio range is 125 Km. As others have stated, it probably flew on a straight trajectory after it lost radio contact. As for flight range, it can fly for 8 to 9 hours. Wiki says its cruising speed is 81 mph, with a 127 mph max speed.
By car, the shortest distance between Ft. Huachuca and Evergreen, CO is 831 miles. That distance by air would be considerably shorter. If it can fly 81 mph for 9 hours, it can travel 729 miles at cruising speed. This would only be a difference of 102 miles based on the driving distance, which is not in a straight line. I'd say given a tail wind, and its original flight altitude, that it is quite conceivable that it made it there under its own power. We get very strong winds up here in the Rockies.
Tell me about it. I thought the wind was going to rip the roof off last night. It's still trying to.
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