PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Fears for Pentagon air power as Iran claims drone capture
Old 10th Dec 2011, 16:12
  #169 (permalink)  
Mechta
 
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: At home
Posts: 1,232
Received 3 Likes on 3 Posts
Jamesdevice,

Depending upon the level of redundancy the RQ-170 designers buit in, it would be likely to have some sort of inertial navigation system as a backup to any GPS or terrain interpreting system (I don't know if the latter exists). Assuming that areasonable degree of electromagnetic shielding has been built into the avionics boxes, an inertial navigation system, I would have thought, would keep working. Maybe that Avtobasa sytem played a part in helping the remote operator lose his uplink, and send the RQ-170 into a 'return home' mode, but I think that its unlikely to have directly permanently damaged anything onboard.

Hexboy, The Americans may have systems to burn out components if the RQ-170 is believed lost after its flight duration, but putting explosives in it runs the risk of bad publicity if it is first found by children who are subsequently maimed or killed by it intentionally exploding. After all, America has not yet declared war on Iran. Surveillance and espionage is all part of the 'game'. Once it turns to indiscriminate killing by the Americans, the Americans may be seen by the world to have stepped things up a gear. They don't want another 'USS Vincennes'.

Temprarily losing an uplink is not that uncommon with UAVs, so operators wouldn't want to destroy it until they were absolutely sure they wouldn't get it back.
Mechta is offline