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From: David Clarke <crazydiamonds@compuserve.com>
Date: Sun, 13 Jun 1999 14:29:12 -0400
Fwd Date: Sun, 13 Jun 1999 16:01:39 -0400
Subject: Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Crosses Atlantic


This story will be released to the UK Media on 14.6.99:

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle sparks UFO Scare

by David Clarke

A MINIATURE robot aircraft survived a 2,000 kilometre
trans-Atlantic test flight guided only by remote control to a
missile range on a remote Scottish island.

The US-Navy funded UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) landed safely
at the British Army's testing range on the island of Benbecula
following a record-breaking flight.

Three other tiny drones - just ten foot long with a ten foot
wingspan - crashed and disappeared over the choppy north
Atlantic seas during the secret operation last November, And the
strange-looking aircraft - called the Aerosonde - triggered a
string of UFO sightings to the Scottish Coastguard stations as
it was guided in to land at the remote military base in the
Outer Hebrides.

A British Army spokesman said: "It's a very small robot aircraft
and its amazing that it managed to fly that distance and land
safely." The UAV used a satellite guidance system to navigate
and was programmed to avoid the worst of the North Atlantic
weather. Once it came within range of Benbecula it circled until
a US pilot on the ground was able to guide it slowly in to land
at the missile testing range.

A spokesman for Stornoway Coastguard on the Isle of Lewis said:
"All the coastguard stations in this area were warned by the
Army to keep a look out for these drones coming in from the
North Atlantic, especially in case they triggered UFO sightings.

"There were a number of people ringing in reporting having
seen UFOs at the time, one of them even said it had flown
over Stornoway."

Defence chiefs are now hailing the UAV as the strategic weapon
of the future after the successful test flight of the Aerosonde,
which is designed for "long range environmental monitoring."

Already the Royal Australian Air Force has invested 30 million
dollars into the development of a long-range UAV called Global
Hawk to carry out surveillance of neighbouring countries in
southeast Asia.

The Global Hawk, developed by Teledyne Ryan, is capable of 20
hour endurance flights of more than 5,000 km before having to
return to base.

And British Army experience who are developing their own
sophisticated unmanned aircraft say the remotely piloted drones
could be widely used on future battlefields.

UAVs are known to have played a large role in the recent NATO
campaign in Kosovo and Serbia.

Major Roy Denton of the British Army Hebrides said: "We are
involved in the development and testing of a number of unmanned
aerial vehicles.

"It's cheapter and safer than putting a serviceman into a
dangerous battlefield."