Hundreds of UK drones 'missing' in Iraq and Afghanistan

[ops 2,259]

[left][img]http://gallery.military.ir/albums/userpics/10166/macgregor-luke-reuters_n5B15D.jpg[/img][/left]

[left]Britain has lost 447 of its military drones in Iraq and Afghanistan. The aircraft have crashed, broken down or gone missing during operations, adding to international outrage over civilian deaths and debate over the safety of their use in Britain.[/left]

[left]The UK’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) has reported that the loss of 447 unmanned drones was due to technical faults, controller error or not wanting to remove them from volatile enemy areas, according to the Guardian newspaper.[/left]

[left]Small handheld devices, large UAVs, and a missile-carrying drone were all lost in the last five years.[/left]
[left]


[/left]
[left][b] UK drones lost in Afghanistan and Iraq[/b][/left]
[left][b]- Desert Hawk 3 – Small, handheld UAV; 412 have crashed or been lost.[/b][/left]
[left][b]- Tarantula Hawk and Black Hornet miniature surveillance helicopter – Mini UAVs; 25 have been lost.[/b][/left]
[left][b]- Reaper drone – Hellfire missile-carrying drone; one has been lost, costing over $15mn.[/b][/left]
[left][b]- Hermes 450 – Large UAV; nine have been lost, costing $1.5mn each.[/b][/left]

[left]Many have not been replaced and are lost for good, costing the UK millions. An MOD official stated that no deaths or injuries have resulted from the drone losses. However, the smaller drones which are more liable to crashing are similar to those which may be introduced into UK airspace, prompting safety concerns alongside existing fears of privacy violations.[/left]

[left]The contentious issue of continued drone usage by Western forces sparked an outcry from a UK watchdog.“The drone industry constantly talks up the supposed economic benefits of unmanned drones, but it is the civil liberties and safety implications that need real attention,”Chris Cole, founder of watchdog website Drone Wars UK told the Guardian.[/left]

[left]The overall number of civilian deaths caused by drone strikes abroad has been difficult to confirm. However, estimates by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism reported 2,562 to 3,325 deaths from drone strikes in Pakistan, including 474 to 881 civilian deaths.[/left]

[left]Drone strikes were responsible for the deaths of 531 to 779 people, with a civilian casualty rate between 4 percent and 8.5 percent as of June 2012, according to a report by the New America Foundation. Both statistics were laid out in a 2012 report by the Human Rights Clinic at Columbia Law School and the Center for Civilians in Conflict.[/left]

[left]The impact of strikes in other aspects of civilian life has been severe, harming not only the individual, but their families, friends and neighbors. “Covert drone strikes cause other kinds of harm to civilians and local communities,” the report said. Militant groups can pursue retaliatory attacks against those they suspect of being informants, a kind of harm not always reported on by the press.[/left]

[left]In January of this year, the UN began an investigation into US and UK drone attacks, the resulting civilian casualties and the drone program's legal implications. The UN will examine the use of UAVs in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia, and will publish its findings next autumn.[/left]

[left]UN special Rapporteur Ben Emmerson told the Guardian newspaper in January that “one of the questions we will be looking at is whether, given the local demography, aerial attacks carry too high a risk of a disproportionate number of civilian casualties.”[/left]

[left][b] UK's ‘Eye in the Sky’[/b][/left]
[left]UK plans to open its airspace to unmanned surveillance vehicles has been met with great resistance, and fears of an ‘eye in the sky’ have been rampant in British media. By August 2012, the UK's airspace regulator, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA), had already handed out 120 permits for the smaller drone models.[/left]

[left]“According to our analysis, there have been more than 100 crashes of the larger class of military unmanned aerial vehicles in over 20 countries since 2007,” Cole told the Guardian. “However, it is likely that it is the smaller class of drones – less than 150kg – that will be used most often in civil[/left]
[left]airspace and the revelation that over 400 British drones of this type have crashed in Afghanistan is startling[/left]

[left][url="http://rt.com/news/military-drones-lost-uk-080/"]here[/url][/left]

[misalu2001 361]

Do not miss judge this. Even if hundreds of UAVs are lost it does not necessarily mean that they are unreliable!
This article clearly does not respect the fact that any creature is likely to malfunction. There is nothing we can do about it. Accepting this fact, we come to a conclusion:
“the important figure of merit for durability should be the mean time before failure.”
This article clearly does not provide any information about MTBF figure and thus the reliability of the UAVs. Just because some UAVs crashed, we have to accept that they are unreliable?
Isn’t this a clear fallacy?
[b]Dear OPS:[/b]
If you are going to select the best of English publications to introduce them to us, be kind and select more informative ones, there is a plenty of them out there.

[cheka 15,065]

misalu

on which sentence of this article it's concluded that these drones are "unreliable" because of their high crash cases ?! it just published the statics that UK defence ministry released itself and discussed the potential damage it can cause if these Drones with many cases of crash used on UK airspace (for safety or surveillance purposes) and urban areas . and if we see , the number of these crashes relative to total number of operational UAV's in UK is quite high and considerable .

for example Guardian newspaper wrote that with 8 (or 9) Hermes-450 Drones which have been lost , surveillance fleet of UK has been halved ! it means half of the UK's Hermes-450 drones which has been fielded just in 2007 are lost .

[ops 2,259]

misalu

if u dont like this source u can pursue this news in other sources,but nothing more in those.and listen to my friend oo
anyway i like punctuality in RT

[misalu2001 361]

[quote name='cheka' timestamp='1360767688' post='300010']
misalu

on which sentence of this article it's concluded that these drones are "unreliable" because of their high crash cases ?! it just published the statics that UK defence ministry released itself and discussed the potential damage it can cause if these Drones with many cases of crash used on UK airspace (for safety or surveillance purposes) and urban areas . and if we see , the number of these crashes relative to total number of operational UAV's in UK is quite high and considerable .

for example Guardian newspaper wrote that with 8 (or 9) Hermes-450 Drones which have been lost , surveillance fleet of UK has been halved ! it means half of the UK's Hermes-450 drones which has been fielded just in 2007 are lost .
[/quote]

Dear cheka
The main idea behind condemning the use of the UAVs in this article is that they may crash. But without the MTBF figure and merely by the total number of crashed UAVs one cannot conclude the risks of the action.
For example, if each of the UAVs had flew 1 trillion hours before the crash, we can conclude that MTBF is 1 trillion hours and therefore using them for surveillance purposes even if they provide marginally satisfactory benefits, seems reasonable.
On the other hand, if each of the UAVs had flew 10 minutes before the crash, then we can conclude that the MTBF is 10 minutes and therefore they should be used when the benefit of their service is huge and even then with significant care.
The number of lost UAVs those not tell us anything about the MTBF! But the article uses the number as a basis to prove they should not be used for surveillance purposes.

==================================

You mentioned that some Hermes drones have been lost and their loss caused significant troubles. The same reasoning can be applied here. We don’t know how many hours they served before crashing!
Crashing is natural for any airplane! If we cannot conclude about the amount of the benefit the UAV provided before crashing, we cannot asses the cost/benefit of the action.
In the other words, I can say that cars killed 1 hundred thousand people the last year. Is that sufficient for your decision on whether to ban the use of the car or Do you need to know the benefits of this action?

[quote name='ops' timestamp='1360768786' post='300016']
misalu

if u dont like this source u can pursue this news in other sources,but nothing more in those

[/quote]

Absolutely, but it is a little bit wired that you chose this unfair article between tons of informative ones flooding the net!
[quote]
.and listen to my friend oo
anyway i like punctuality in RT
[/quote]
I did not get what you ment. ویرایش شده در بهمن 91 توسط misalu2001

[bigbang 1,506]

when you have a new subject and Intent to Discuss must be with Approach Teaching .

[misalu2001 361]

[quote name='bigbang' timestamp='1360777470' post='300042']
when you have a new subject and Intent to Discuss must be with Approach Teaching .
[/quote]
And what is approach teaching?

[misalu2001 361]

[quote name='wilhelm' timestamp='1360778584' post='300048']
so what?
we must speak english in this topic?
[/quote]
"We must spaek English in this topic" is not a question.
if you want to ask a question, you should convert your sentence to question form.
for example:
I am misalu?
is wrong. the correct sentence should be like this:
Am i misalu?
=========================================

back to your point, yes we are trying to improve our writing skills while discussing.

[worior 25,976]

[left]off topic ، wrong discussion [/left]

[cheka 15,065]

[quote name='misalu2001' timestamp='1360769906' post='300018']
The main idea behind condemning the use of the UAVs in this article is that they may crash. But without the MTBF figure and merely by the total number of crashed UAVs one cannot conclude the risks of the action.
For example, if each of the UAVs had flew 1 trillion hours before the crash, we can conclude that MTBF is 1 trillion hours and therefore using them for surveillance purposes even if they provide marginally satisfactory benefits, seems reasonable.
On the other hand, if each of the UAVs had flew 10 minutes before the crash, then we can conclude that the MTBF is 10 minutes and therefore they should be used when the benefit of their service is huge and even then with significant care.
[/quote]

if i'm not mistaken we cannot take MTBF figure in this case , the "mean time between failure" figure is assumed and Defined for systems which are repairable immediately (or at least repairable) ! But in the whole UAV (note that i mean whole UAV as a system not it's components) we have not such situation and failure usualy ends in crash and loss of UAV .

but i think service lifetime table can be a good substitution for MTBF in this case , with this assumption it's 2 modes : either the crashed UAV was out of it's recommended service life which shows UK army is poorer than it could retire it's UAV fleet before their service life expires or the crashed UAV's lifetime (taking into account the causes mentioned in the article for crashes : technical fault , controller failure) was lower than it's recommended service life which indicates they are unreliable !

[Generalmohammad 3,178]

[left]may be we will see them in our defense ministry with a new name in close future like "shahed 129" or "shadow" UAVs [/left]

[misalu2001 361]

[quote name='cheka' timestamp='1360781358' post='300063']

if i'm not mistaken we cannot take MTBF figure in this case , the "mean time between failure" figure is assumed and Defined for systems which are repairable immediately (or at least repairable) ! But in the whole UAV (note that i mean whole UAV as a system not it's components) we have not such situation and failure usualy ends in crash and loss of UAV .

but i think service lifetime table can be a good substitution for MTBF in this case , with this assumption it's 2 modes : either the crashed UAV was out of it's recommended service life which shows UK army is poorer than it could retire it's UAV fleet before their service life expires or the crashed UAV's lifetime (taking into account the causes mentioned in the article for crashes : technical fault , controller failure) was lower than it's recommended service life which indicates they are unreliable !
[/quote]

MTBF is currently in use for cases similar to our case. For example, it is used to mandate a reliability constraint on peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles. MTBF is the best representation of the unreliability from statistics perspective for a system with many sub systems. I can explain why this makes sense but I think you will be bored!
On the other hand, we frequently use the concept of “life time”. For example we are advised to change the time belt of our automobiles every 100,000 Km. this cannot show the reliability of the time belt!
How frequently time belts will malfunction when they are used within their recommended life time? Are they absolutely immune to malfunction when they are used less than 100,000 Km? We simply don’t know! But if the manufacturer supplies us with MTBF, we can come up with the probability of failure. In fact, the standard organization uses the MTBF not “life time”.
To sum up, if I have the MTBF figure, and I want to be 95% sure that my system won’t crash, I can easily come up with proper “life time”. If I want to be 98% sure, I will come up with other “life time” and so on.
That is to say that a single object can have different “life time” values when we are interested to different reliabilities.

[cheka 15,065]

[quote name='misalu2001' timestamp='1360783812' post='300072']
MTBF is currently in use for cases similar to our case. [b]For example, it is used to mandate a reliability constraint on peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles[/b]. MTBF is the best representation of the unreliability from statistics perspective for a system with many sub systems. I can explain why this makes sense but I think you will be bored!
On the other hand, we frequently use the concept of “life time”. For example we are advised to change the time belt of our automobiles every 100,000 Km. this cannot show the reliability of the time belt!
How frequently time belts will malfunction when they are used within their recommended life time? Are they absolutely immune to malfunction when they are used less than 100,000 Km? We simply don’t know! But if the manufacturer supplies us with MTBF, we can come up with the probability of failure. In fact, the standard organization uses the MTBF not “life time”.
[/quote]

first , the peacekeeper is retired from 2005

secondly , the sentence i bolded from your post is the exactly reason i said the thing about "components in a UAV" ! You can use MTBF to measure mean time between failures of an ICBM's Subsystems and components but not the whole missile ! for example in the link below , MTBF is used for measuring reliability of NS-20 electronic guidance system of minuteman III missile but not the whole missile !

no explanation is needed for this just show me one document or source that is measuring MTBF of an whole ICBM or aircraft

and about service life i didn't say it plays the role same as MTBF and with all of these figure we can never say we are immune to failure ! maybe Availability is the most relating factor to reliability of a system

[misalu2001 361]

[quote name='cheka' timestamp='1360786276' post='300080']
[quote name='misalu2001' timestamp='1360783812' post='300072']
MTBF is currently in use for cases similar to our case. [b]For example, it is used to mandate a reliability constraint on peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles[/b]. MTBF is the best representation of the unreliability from statistics perspective for a system with many sub systems. I can explain why this makes sense but I think you will be bored!
On the other hand, we frequently use the concept of “life time”. For example we are advised to change the time belt of our automobiles every 100,000 Km. this cannot show the reliability of the time belt!
How frequently time belts will malfunction when they are used within their recommended life time? Are they absolutely immune to malfunction when they are used less than 100,000 Km? We simply don’t know! But if the manufacturer supplies us with MTBF, we can come up with the probability of failure. In fact, the standard organization uses the MTBF not “life time”.
[/quote]

first , the peacekeeper is retired from 2005

secondly , the sentence i bolded from your post is the exactly reason i said the thing about "components in a UAV" ! You can use MTBF to measure mean time between failures of an ICBM's Subsystems and components but not the whole missile ! for example in the link below , MTBF is used for measuring reliability of NS-20 electronic guidance system of minuteman III missile but not the whole missile !

no explanation is needed for this just show me one document or source that is measuring MTBF of an whole ICBM or aircraft

and about service life i didn't say it plays the role same as MTBF and with all of these figure we can never say we are immune to failure ! maybe Availability is the most relating factor to reliability of a system
[/quote]
I do not have an example but MTBF logically can be used for whole system. Anyway, Let us focus on the main idea:
Whether this article is misrepresenting UAVs’ reliability or not.
I would say that by merely using the number of lost UAVs as a basis to condemn the reliability of the UAVs, this article is clearly misrepresenting the facts.
First of all, it assumes that the level of reliability is just related to the number of crashes. On the contrary, we have to know how many UAVs completed their missions without crashing and how many crashed. or how frequently they crash.
(the example is represented in my last post)
Second, this article assumes that the level of reliability for UAVs used for surveillance would be equal to those used in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is not necessarily true. For example the level of maintenance and quality standards can defer. That is to say that it is possible that for economical reasons, the UAVs in Iraq and Afghanistan are not maintained in their best conditions or their parts are not changed as frequently as it would be replaced when they are being used in homeland.
For example, some parts that are expensive may not be changed as frequently when losing a UAV has minor consequences (they do not care about Afghan civilians) but when the UAV is used in homeland, the consequence of damaging a human is considerable so they may improve the mandated standards (which will of course lead to higher expences).

[cheka 15,065]

coincidentaly i believe for a system such as missile MTBF cannot be defined ! the missile is not a computer with continous working overs !

about article i agree with you partially but that is how journalists write and there is 2 things in this case : 1- we can get other information about total number of these UAV's and their operations from other source (like the hermes 450 fleet) and if we see in just 6 years an fleet of hermes-450 UAVs is halved by the losses and incidents we can inacurrately say these 1 bln UAVs are far from reliable with no additional information !

and about using in UK , please note that in afghanistan and iraq UAVs are used in military operations ! of course they don' care about afghans but they definitely care about themselves aren't they ? this UAVs (which are not so cheap) are supposed to give them monitoring capability in various condition so i don't think UAVs that are used in army have lower maintenance than those used in law enforcement or civil organizations ! actually they will get highest maintenance to ensure their endurance during the operations