Radio 4, 8 p.m., Monday

[Buster11]

Radio 4 is trailing a programme at 8 p.m. this evening titled RoboWars, on the use of military drones. May or may not be worth listening to, but don't hold your breath.

[gearontheglide]

Caught the trailer last night. They will be interviewing the team at Creech as part of the programme.

[Jabba_TG12]

"....on the use of military drones"

Ah. So not a reference Sir Jock and Co??? :}

[The B Word]

Here it is BBC - BBC Radio 4 Programmes - Robo Wars, Episode 1 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00qbxv5)

I think the reporter "Stephen Sackur" might be BEagle; the amount of times he was told that they are Remotely Piloted Air Systems and he still insisted on calling them "Drones"!

I thought that Timmo Anderson (ACAS) came over pretty well, as did the chaps from Creech. An interesting discussion on the old meaning of "going to war" versus what these guys do abd still having to use weapons to take life.

[virgo]

Do the people "flying" these drones from an underground bunker in Texas get campaign medals for the appropriate hostile area ????

[TOWTEAMBASE]

anybody know why these things take off using one pilot, then is handed over to a second pilot to fly the mission, then back to the previous pilot to land it again. not saying they all do it, but seen programes on it before. on the mission the take off/landing pilot was close by, but the mission pilot was the other side of the world in the states ?

[The B Word]

anybody know why these things take off using one pilot, then is handed over to a second pilot to fly the mission, then back to the previous pilot to land it again. not saying they all do it, but seen programes on it before. on the mission the take off/landing pilot was close by, but the mission pilot was the other side of the world in the states ?

The crew at the launch and recovery team might launch and recover a dozen of these a day for a dozen different mission crews. This cuts down on your footprint in theatre. You could use just 2 crews in Afghanistan to launch a whole squadron's worth of aircraft on a 3 month detachment, which, is a really easy force protection footprint. Your mission crews can fly the main portion of the missions without the need to detach and go home every day - they can also share the fatigue burden of flying single aircraft for 14-20hrs per day.

Do the people "flying" these drones from an underground bunker in Texas get campaign medals for the appropriate hostile area ????

Not unless they deploy on the launch team, but this may change in the future. Let's face it we gave gongs to tanker crews and E-3Ds in tow-lines on the safe side of the border in the past - so why not for crews that are taking shots against the enemy from the safety of a control cabin?

Finally, they aren't "drones" OK :ok:, they're Remotely Piloted Air Systems and they are most definately "flown" with a stick and throttle via EO/IR camera (amongst other things). [apologies for the mini-rant]

The B Word

[3engnever]

Damn right B Word, why should we give our tanker mates and AEW guys medals when they are clearly shying away from the action!

[Occasional Aviator]

Is the aforementioned underground bunker in Texas anywhere near the portakabins in Nevada?

[Gainesy]

Probably the main reason that folk stick to "Drones" is because the the Drone community changes what they want the things called every other week.

I'm well in favour by the way, whatever you call them anything that just kills the Talib bastards is good.

(One suggests Drone as a short all-rounder, familiar to most:E)

[Coonman]

I believe its because of the time it takes for the signal to get to and from the UAV; Its gets critical at TO and Land

[pontifex]

B Word. I wonder if you know just how many times UK tanker crews in the past have gone deep into hostile airspace to "rescue" an aircraft or mission that had not gone to plan and got itself into trouble. Remember Bob Tuxford's actions during Black Buck for which he got the AFC? I think your comments were a little ill judged.

[The B Word]

Pontifex

I do believe that individual acts of that nature normally attracts MIDs, DFCs, AFCs or higher. I also believe that Tanker mates and AEW crews should get campaign medals, but I see flying, and supporting ops, in the rear area as no more risky as those in Nevada supporting ops in a Gnd Ctrl Stn. Not meant to be a dig at rear area flyers but more a "if they can have them, then why not the RPUAS crews?"

Apologies for any spitting of feathers that I may have caused!

The B Word :ok:

[Rotax]

I believe its because of the time it takes for the signal to get to and from the UAV; Its gets critical at TO and Land The launch and recovery element operate with a line-of-sight link to the aircraft which has no delay. The satellite link from the USA to the aircraft is encrypted and it is the encryption/decryption that creates the almost 2-second delay, not the distance the signal travels.

Landing the Reaper is difficult enough line-of-sight, and I don't believe it has ever been successfully attempted over the satellite link, hence the need for the small footprint in theatre.