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Iran shot down a Navy Grumman RF-4 drone
The RQ-4 is slow and has no countermeasures to protect itself so if it goes inside enemy airspace just a couple of miles it is dead meat. What was the rationiale by DOD, USAF and Navy to spend billions on something that can´t gather intel beyond a mere 50-80 nautical miles. SEVEN DECADES AGO the Soviet Union had already developed SAM missiles capable to shoot down anything above FL 50K: on May Day 1960 Gary Powers' U2 was shot down deep inside Russian airspace. Two years later Maj. Rudolph… (www.wired.com) 기타...
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curious article. 16 tons {Global Hawk approximate weight} could be compared to just about anything, i.e.[Four large pickup trucks] or [a charter bus] or [two Toyota 8FCGCU30 forklifts] but no, the standard unit of measure selected by the author was [seven shipping containers of cocaine] WHAT?!?
There appears to be a discrepancy in the claimed UAV position at the time it was hit. The Iranians have released a track showing positions at 2 minute intervals from the time the UAV took off until it was hit by the Iranian missile at 25 59 43 N 57 02 25 E. This position appears to me to be within/above Iranian territorial waters, approximately 10 miles off their coast.
I have not seen any tracing data released by Centcom, but I have seen a photograph a photograph the released of an aerial explosion which appears to occur at 25 57 42 N 56 58 22 E at 22,289 feet. This position does not appear to me to be within/above Iranian territorial waters.
Both locations do appear to be within the Iranian FIR. I am not aware of current regulations or International agreements for identifying a/c operating within a Civilian (ATC administered) FIR
I do not know if nighttime VFR without Transponders is permitted in this Region or if the UAV was squawking and if so this was what the Iranians were tracking. It is also possible that the UAV was capable of spoofing its position and the Iranian data is inaccurately based on such a spoof. However, if the Iranian tracking was accurate, and it is a fact that the Iranians were able to hit the UAV with a missile, it is possible that the positions the Iranians released are accurate. This means the Iranians are capable of tracking (and intercepting) an aerial target. This also would mean that the final 1 hour and 44 minutes of the UAV flight was within the Iranian FIR.
The Iranians state that they issued a warning when the UAV entered their FIR and this was ignored. The Iranians also claim that the UAV was not targeted until it was within/above their territorial waters. Both claims appear to be verified by the track the Iranians published.
It would be very helpful if Centcom would release their version of the UAV's track, if not the entire flight at least the final 30 minutes or so, with the positions at the same intervals of the track released by Iran. This would substantially increase the credibility of Centcom's claims and facilitate evaluation of the relative merits of the claims.
I have not seen any tracing data released by Centcom, but I have seen a photograph a photograph the released of an aerial explosion which appears to occur at 25 57 42 N 56 58 22 E at 22,289 feet. This position does not appear to me to be within/above Iranian territorial waters.
Both locations do appear to be within the Iranian FIR. I am not aware of current regulations or International agreements for identifying a/c operating within a Civilian (ATC administered) FIR
I do not know if nighttime VFR without Transponders is permitted in this Region or if the UAV was squawking and if so this was what the Iranians were tracking. It is also possible that the UAV was capable of spoofing its position and the Iranian data is inaccurately based on such a spoof. However, if the Iranian tracking was accurate, and it is a fact that the Iranians were able to hit the UAV with a missile, it is possible that the positions the Iranians released are accurate. This means the Iranians are capable of tracking (and intercepting) an aerial target. This also would mean that the final 1 hour and 44 minutes of the UAV flight was within the Iranian FIR.
The Iranians state that they issued a warning when the UAV entered their FIR and this was ignored. The Iranians also claim that the UAV was not targeted until it was within/above their territorial waters. Both claims appear to be verified by the track the Iranians published.
It would be very helpful if Centcom would release their version of the UAV's track, if not the entire flight at least the final 30 minutes or so, with the positions at the same intervals of the track released by Iran. This would substantially increase the credibility of Centcom's claims and facilitate evaluation of the relative merits of the claims.
The headline listed here is quite confusing and me trying to figure out what in the world an RF-4 was doing there, and since when were they built by Grumman?
The RQ-4 is slow without countermeasures to protect itself so if it goes inside enemy airspace just a couple of miles it is dead meat. What was the rationiale by DOD, USAF and Navy to spend billions on something that can´t gather intel beyond a mere 50-80 nautical miles. SEVEN DECADES AGO the Soviet Union had already developed SAM missiles capable to shoot down anything above FL 50K: on May Day 1960 Gary Powers' U2 was shot down deep inside Russian airspace. Two years later Maj. Rudolph Anderson was shot down over Cuba during the Missile Crisis. Can someone from the AWACS/Orion/Poseidon cummunities explain this major inconsistency.
