More Air Force Drones Are Crashing Than Ever As Mysterious New Problems Emerge (washingtonpost.com)

schwit1 points out that a record number of Air Force drones crashed in major accidents last year. Leading the accident count is the Reaper which has seen a number of sudden electrical failures. The Washington Post reports: "A record number of Air Force drones crashed in major accidents last year, documents show, straining the U.S. military's fleet of robotic aircraft when it is in more demand than ever for counterterrorism missions in an expanding array of war zones. Driving the increase was a mysterious surge in mishaps involving the Air Force's newest and most advanced 'hunter-killer' drone, the Reaper, which has become the Pentagon's favored weapon for conducting surveillance and airstrikes against the Islamic State, al-Qaeda and other militant groups. The Reaper has been bedeviled by a rash of sudden electrical failures that have caused the 21/2-ton drone to lose power and drop from the sky, according to accident-investigation documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. Investigators have traced the problem to a faulty starter-generator,but have been unable to pinpoint why it goes haywire or devise a permanent fix.

Comments

Not that hard to figure out...

[Anonymous Coward]

Air Force Academy is in Colorado,
Colorado legalizes Marijuana,
Drones crash.

Doah!

Re:It's not surprising

[Locke2005]

Business schools teach that employees are fungible assets, i.e. interchangeable parts, so the only things that matter are things that can be tracked on spreadsheets -- like process. The fact that people matter is quickly becoming forgotten in the quest for maximizing quarterly return on investment.

Just bad parts

[randomErr]

The issue is that we're on generation 3 and 4 of these air crafts. From what I hear a lot of the original systems have been re-engineered to be lighter, more power efficient, and easier to source parts for. But in the process the design, especially main controller, has cut corners. They now have thinner leads on the boards that can't take extreme temperatures or electrical interference caused by extreme loads on straining motors. Also they're taking these units on longer mission in more extreme conditions putting more stress on the machines.