Merged Iran Shoots Down US Drone?

CTB said:
I'd be surprised if the craft was shot down.

Malfunction possibly, but the notion that it just accidentally came down on Iranian soil is a little disingenuous. If the USA isn't trying to spy on Iran using all it's best gadgets then my name's Elmer Fudd ( I've been called worse )

So, the Iranians have a bit of a propaganda victory, but it's more likely to be for domestic consumption rather than trying to stoke international indignation.
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Well, it might not necessarily be for either reason but simply that they have a drone.

It might indeed be useful for internal propaganda and I expect most of the international community would think, well, if it is a US spy drone and Iran did shoot it down or even if it came down by itself on Iranian soil then fair play to the Iranians.
 
rjh01 said:
How to tell if it was shot down or a technical malfunction. If it happens again it was shot down. After all if you can do it once you can do it again. If it was a freak whatever then it would never happen again.
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Let's have a bet, I will believe it will never happen again and you can bet that it will.

No, wait... Let's change bets.

I will believe it will happen again and you can believe it will never happen again.

If I win I get a zillion dollars and if you win I give you a zillion dollars, fair?

Okay, and anyway, there's a thread up:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=225237
 
rjh01 said:
How to tell if it was shot down or a technical malfunction. If it happens again it was shot down. After all if you can do it once you can do it again. If it was a freak whatever then it would never happen again.
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Sometimes people do get lucky when they take a potshot at something though.
Not saying that's what happened, but its not inconcievable either. A bullet sucked into the engine intake would wreck pretty much any flying object.
 
I just find it strange that all what is left is not some smouldering wreck. I would expect that a bullet in a vital spot would cause a large fire. Maybe it tried to land at what it thought was home base but it was in Iran.
 
rjh01 said:
I just find it strange that all what is left is not some smouldering wreck. I would expect that a bullet in a vital spot would cause a large fire. Maybe it tried to land at what it thought was home base but it was in Iran.
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The Fox News link above says the craft is designed to try to land itself rather than crash. (Then again it also says it's so sooper seekrit that it's a major loss for the US and gain for Iran, whereas Wikipedia says "Aviation Week postulates that ... the designers have avoided 'highly sensitive technologies' due to the near certainty of eventual operational loss ... and a desire to avoid the risk of compromising leading edge technology". So, pinches of salt all round.)
 
SezMe said:
Suppose they do have a somewhat intact drone? How much could they learn by taking it apart?
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Probably less than they could get selling it to china.

As far as I'm aware there isn't much non-civilian tech in drones other than the stealthing and the software. Iran hasn't shown much interest in stealth and by the time you can usefully reverse engineer the software you can probably write your own.
 
CTB said:
I'd be surprised if the craft was shot down.
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Why? Iran has spent rather a lot on air defence and since drones aren't very fast even a visual lock would probably let you get a kill.

Malfunction possibly, but the notion that it just accidentally came down on Iranian soil is a little disingenuous. If the USA isn't trying to spy on Iran using all it's best gadgets then my name's Elmer Fudd ( I've been called worse )
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Questionable. Gadgets against goverments tends to be difficult. One of the lessions learned from iraq is that you need human intelligance.
 
geni said:
Why? Iran has spent rather a lot on air defence and since drones aren't very fast even a visual lock would probably let you get a kill.



Questionable. Gadgets against goverments tends to be difficult. One of the lessions learned from iraq is that you need human intelligance.
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That's very true, but I'll just assume a drone's recon abilities get you better resolution than google earth.

There was a bit of 'spy' busting going on last week too. which didn't seem to garner as much media coverage.

I think this is a We Know That You Know That We Know You Know, etc kinda thing.
 
rjh01 said:
How to tell if it was shot down or a technical malfunction. If it happens again it was shot down. After all if you can do it once you can do it again. If it was a freak whatever then it would never happen again.
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Um, you know on that basis you'd argue that both the U2 shot down in Russia and the F-117 shot down in Bosnia were not in fact shot down.

An incident like this will promote a review of how they are employing the drones... things like do they need to fly higher, or avoid certain areas, or have other assets around to monitor for SAM radars, or fly more randomised flight patterns, or a dozen other things. It's entirely possible that one drone shot down will lead to changes that ensure no more will be shot down.
 
The chances of Iran even seeing the thing, much less tracking it to shoot it down at all are between slim and none.
A malfunctioning machine that wandered off and ran out of fuel and crashed where it was noticed is the most likely situation.
Depending on what survives the crash, the data stream information used for those machines could be compromised when the Chinese evaluate it.
 
Seismosaurus said:
Um, you know on that basis you'd argue that both the U2 shot down in Russia and the F-117 shot down in Bosnia were not in fact shot down.

An incident like this will promote a review of how they are employing the drones... things like do they need to fly higher, or avoid certain areas, or have other assets around to monitor for SAM radars, or fly more randomised flight patterns, or a dozen other things. It's entirely possible that one drone shot down will lead to changes that ensure no more will be shot down.
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I agree if it does not happen again then we cannot tell for sure what happened. However if it does happen again then this would be evidence either that the drone has a fault or the Iranians know how to shoot down invisible drones.
 
I Ratant said:
The chances of Iran even seeing the thing, much less tracking it to shoot it down at all are between slim and none.
A malfunctioning machine that wandered off and ran out of fuel and crashed where it was noticed is the most likely situation.
Depending on what survives the crash, the data stream information used for those machines could be compromised when the Chinese evaluate it.
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I agree. Sometimes on a patrol we'd hear a "lawnmower in the sky" but we never saw it. Much more likely it malfunctioned (over Afghanistan) and crashed across the border.
 
Iran releases a video of the captured drone. Not only is it intact, but there's barely a scratch on it.




My father's B-17 was hit by flak over northern Italy during WWII, forcing the crew to bail out. The plane glided to the ground and survived largely intact. The fuselage broke in half at impact and the vertical stab flopped to the side, but beyond that it was in surprisingly good condition. The Germans took pictures of it which were later published in a book.

Steve S
 
steve s said:
Iran releases a video of the captured drone. Not only is it intact, but there's barely a scratch on it.




My father's B-17 was hit by flak over northern Italy during WWII, forcing the crew to bail out. The plane glided to the ground and survived largely intact. The fuselage broke in half at impact and the vertical stab flopped to the side, but beyond that it was in surprisingly good condition. The Germans took pictures of it which were later published in a book.

Steve S
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That video mentions a dozen other drones shot down over Iran. Now I did predict that shooting down of a drone may not be a once off incident. If Iran can provide evidence of other crashes in Iran then it is reasonable to assume this one was shot down too. Though how an invisible drone can be shot down without damage is hard to imagine. Maybe they managed to give it a few commands, like your destination is this airfield?
 
I wouldn't be surprised the thing ran out of fuel and simply glided to earth. Likely has some manner of auto-landing software...
Probably doesn't weigh much; composite construction.
The hacking claim sounds like propaganda.
 
rjh01 said:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-09/iranian-tv-shows-downed-drone/3721450?WT.mc_id=newsmail


If it ran out of fuel then someone messed up. Also it should have tried to get back to a safe place or crash at high speed to avoid what has actually happened.
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Talking about "should have" implies that you are an expert in drone operations protocols and planning, probably with specific subject matter expertise in RQ-170 Sentinel operations. Is this the case? If so, can you provide your credentials, so that we know we are talking to an expert who knows what they're talking about? If not, can you provide the original source of your opinion, so that we can consider their credentials and expertise directly?
 
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