I am just going to give you all something to think about. The drone that was first 'shot' down, is now being shown on Al Jejerria tv , complete and fully intact. Now, since our fearless leader O Great one would not allow the military to shoot it down or to call in a missle strike on it, they have it intact. Interesting enough by itself. But, imagine that it won't take more then a few months to copy them and then the mussies will be sending them over to Israel. Now that would make my shorts pucker up real tight like if I were them. Any real pres would not have hesitated to have it shot down, or at the very least , called in a very large and final missle strike on it , upon seeing where it landed. Also, how did the mussies get controll of it to be able to land it ? Sounds fishy to me.
May as well just make stealth technology an Open Source endeavor at this point. Pakistani's allowed the Chinese to examine and take samples from the crashed stealth Blackhawk... now Iran (and Russia) will have a this example to toy with.
Should do what the Israelis did awhile back - have it equipped with a self-destruct - the muzzos grab it, open it and "BOOM!" Instant 'good muslims'.....
That's what I was thinking that way the enemy wouldn't get any secret info and it wouldn't be a total loss. Enemy takes it back to the strong hold and poof no more strong hold, plus like you said another good group of muslim's.
maybe not so much The image shown on Al Jazzera IS NOT the drone in question. That is IRNA image is re-sourced video from the US. The drone is likely in pieces like this one lost earlier. Having helped to pick up a lot of crashed aircraft on the Nellis range, little is left of any real use. As for the stealth skin, Russia already has their own version (T-50) With the Chinese not too far behind with a working prototype. Tho there are many who doubt the PLAs claims. Lets not for get, the backward Serbs managed to turn a multimillion F-117 into this inside of Yugoslavia in 1999. Stuff happens, I think this time little was lost.... YMMV
A 4-star General, said that that is in fact our drone ! I Wonder what Russia would trade Iran for it ? Hmmm maybe something that would glow in the dark ?
My bad, was looking at the AJ site. U.S. officials say they are still trying to determine whether the aircraft shown on Iranian television today was the American stealth drone that went down in Iran last week. Early Thursday, U.S. officials said, and ABC News reported, that the craft displayed did not appear to be the highly sensitive RQ-170 Sentinel and might be a model, in part because U.S. imagery indicated the Sentinel had not landed intact. Later, however, officials said it was possible that the Iranians had reconstructed the drone for display on television, but that the evidence was "inconclusive." and Only six weeks ago, Russia announced delivering the Avtobaza ground-based electronic intelligence and jamming system (shown above) to Iran. Most Russian weapons exports to Iran are blocked, including the proposed transfer of the S-300 surface to air missile system. But there is a key difference between a SAM battery and a jamming system. The S-300 can vastly complicate a strike on an Iranian nuclear site at Natanz or Qoms. A jamming system, such as the Avtobaza, is unlikely to be used to defend such a site because it could interfere with the radar of the S-300 or the Tor-M1 SAM battery. The Avtobaza, moreover, is designed to jam side-looking and fire control radars on aircraft and manipulate the guidance and control systems of incoming enemy missiles. It would be the perfect tool to target and perhaps infiltrate the communications link that allows a UAV to be controlled from a remote location. The incident, of course, has not been confirmed with visual evidence of the allegedly captured RQ-170. Perhaps some Russian help in this ? Whatever the facts are, someone in the CIA has egg on their face...
The guy who should have "Egg on his Face" is the engineer, that designed a non-Secure Control System, that didn't have a Fail-safe Return to Base mode, if the drone lost the Control Link for more than X amount of time. This mode should lower the Loss of Control Link time, as the drone uses up onboard fuel, so that it ALWAYS can "Return to Base" under it's own internal Control System without running out of fuel. This is just plain Stupid, and a MAJOR Design Flaw, in the Command and Control System... I mean "REALLY?" .... Duh.... ..... YMMV.....
Would seem to be something that should have been included without a thought. Heck, low end R/C planes even turn back toward the transmitter if they drop communication.
I can't imagine that a return command wasn't resident on board. I also can't imagine that there's an override in there, too, that could be hacked. What doesn't yet click with me is that photo with the underside concealed, thinking model from readily available on line pix. More to come on this, I betcha.
The one glaring inconsistency I see is the mesh intake covering. I have not seen that present in a single image of the real thing. Not that it couldn't readily have been added in the field...
That is the reason that a SECURE Command and Control Link is so critical for this type of operation.... If the LINK was SECURE, it couldn't be HACKED, just jammed... and the internal "Return to Base" routine trigger should be in the Priority Processing Loop, and un-interruptible, once triggered. Just very Poor Programming, and some engineer, somewhere, should gets his A** Kicked, for not fixing this.... .... YMMV.... Oh yea, the Grill is made of Carbon Fiber and coated with Stealth Paint to absorb Radar Emissions, but designed to allow enough air into the engine, to allow the craft it's maximum designed thrust. I saw a Redneck version of the stuff on RocketCity Rednecks, last week... very creative....
my research into the mesh fan cover seems to indicate this is a radar deflecting device added to cover the fan intake and further reduce the radar signature. It is a not uncommon feature on in-field UAVs.
Guys you worry to much ,this is just the one Odumbass promised Justajerkoff !!! Nothing to worry about,nothing at all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
maybe - it couldn't Let's say the link was disrupted by a jammer. If they had a jammer with enough power to block the control signal, they may well have jammed the GPS signal as well. If the drone didn't have an INS platform, it would get lost, then maybe hit something big - like earth.
For a Rig that big, and expensive, one would think an Internal INS suite would be mandatory, as the basis of the Command and Control Platform. GPS would be just ONE of the Location Inputs, and loss of the Control Link, after a certain amount of time, should trigger, the Return to Base routine. If that wasn't the way these were built, then the JackAss who wrote the Specs, is a bigger idiot, than the Design Engineer, who should have known better, and told the Spec Writer he was an idiot, and done it right, in the first place. .... YMMV....
you would think that something that high end and secret would have a built in auto destruct. Also i severly doubt that if this drone were shot down it would look as good as whats pictured. im thinking replica....
im surprised the all mighty O bummer hasnt put this mess to bed..all he would have to say is his favorite line "I INHERTIED THIS,ITS ALL BUSH'S FAULT"
When aircraft or people operate over or in enemy territory; you can believe "they" accepted losing some.