In a response to a Freedom of Information (FoI) request from Drone Wars UK, the MoD has revealed that two British Reaper drones have crashed since January 2015. The first, ZZ201, crashed on landing in October 2015 when its landing gear collapsed. The MoD has told us previously that this airframe was in the US, awaiting decommissioning due to – MoD press officers told Jane’s – the fact that it was near the end of its viable flying life. It did not mention then that the aircraft had crash landed. Read more
Tag: British drones
Tempestuous relations: Brexit and UK future drone developments
In May 2017, Chair of BAE Systems, Sir Roger Carr, blithely insisted at the company’s AGM that Brexit would have no impact whatsoever on the on-going development of the new Anglo-French advanced combat drone. “We will still be working with the EU on defence, certainly in terms of fighting terrorism, and we can preserve our relationship with France in developing the next generation of unmanned aircraft,” he told shareholders.
Just two months later Carr had to eat his words as a major realignment of European Read more
“Thinking war is bloodless is a mistake.” Talking drones and remote war with Air Marshall Bagwell.
Air Marshall Greg Bagwell is a recently retired senior Royal Air Force officer who served as Deputy Commander Operations at RAF Air Command. While being a vocal supporter of the use of armed drones, in his role of President of the Air Power Association he has also argued for greater openness and engagement with the public on air power issues. Following on from our interview with former RAF Reaper pilot ‘Justin Thompson’, we asked him if he would also be willing to be interviewed on some the wider operational and strategic issues raised by armed drones. He happily agreed. Read more
Scepticism over casualty claims as new data suggests some UK drones may have moved
New data about UK military operations in Iraq and Syria has been released to Drone Wars UK and Vice News over the past few days following separate Freedom of Information (FoI) requests.
Vice News obtained details of the number of combatants killed or wounded in RAF strikes each month since Oct 2014. The data shows that just under 1,000 combatants had been killed with almost 100 wounded. While the MoD are extremely careful to say they cannot Read more