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Crash highlights risks of uncrewed aircraft

24 October 2007

A mix-up between fuel and camera controls caused a 4.5-tonne uncrewed aircraft to smash into a residential area near the town of Nogales, Arizona. No one was hurt but the incident raises serious questions about the safety of flying uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) in civilian airspace and could hamper plans to use them more widely.

On 25 April 2006, a Predator B surveillance UAV belonging to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) was patrolling the Mexican border when the ground pilot’s radio-control console froze, prompting him to switch to a back-up. Last week the US National Transportation Safety Board released…

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