Weird, Birdlike Mystery Drone Crashes in Pakistan

It looks a bit like silver bird. It probably was used to spy on insurgents. And now it’s in the hands of the Pakistanis.


Picture is (C) copyright to Wired

WIRED editor-in-chief Chris Anderson flags pictures of an unusual, unfamiliar drone that reportedly crashed crashed over southwestern Pakistan late last week. It’s a surveillance drone, with a camera attached — recovered from the crash but not apparently visible in this photo — rather than the larger, deathly flying robots that shoot missiles. This one looks tiny, with a wingspan not much longer than a man’s outstretched arms, and clearly light enough for a grown man to carry.

The Pakistani Frontier Corps in Baluchistan province recovered the drone. And they confidently declare it to be an “American surveillance unmanned aerial vehicle.” But as Anderson points out, it doesn’t look like anything the U.S. flies — or at least acknowledges flying. What’s the deal?

Danger Room asked some of our favorite drone and aviation enthusiasts for their perspective on the small mystery drone. And we weren’t the only ones who thought it looked decidedly avian.

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