Oops! I forgot to mention the Belgian Congo IAI Eagle UAV crash:
On the 3rd October 2006 an IAI Eagle UAV crashed after take-off from N'Dolo. Allegedly the pilot was concerned that the aircraft would not get airborne in time before the end of the runway, and so he switched off both engines (!!). However, as the aircraft was already 15-20ft in the air it crashed a few hundred metres after the end of the runway on Boulevard Triomphal. One woman on the ground was killed and at least three others were injured.
The official cause of the crash has been ascribed to a " loss of situational awareness" . The UAV ground controller thought the UAV had not taken off, when in fact it had, and closed down the engines. The UAV then crashed due to the operator instruction to cut engine power.
So where was the UAV to blame for that? I believe that the Belgians do not use "rated pilots" on the Eagles and that they train regular Army JNCOs/SNCOs to do the job. Perhaps if they did, it might have been different? That said, the human has made the error and not the machine.
LJ