An MQ-9 Reaper is retrieved after crashing at the airport in Seychelles. (Courtesy Le Seychellois Hebdo) One of the Air ForceÂ’s premier drones crashed Tuesday morning in the Seychelles, the Indian Ocean archipelago that serves as a base for anti-piracy operations, as well as U.S. surveillance missions over Somalia.The Seychelles, where U.S. officials have worked closely with local officials to establish the drone base, is hardly enemy territory, and the drone that crashed Tuesday was operated by the Air Force, not the CIA, which operated the stealth RQ-170 that crashed in Iran.
Still, TuesdayÂ’s crash once again illustrates the fallibility of unmanned aerial vehicles.
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The Air Force said the cause of the crash — the first ever of a Reaper in the Seychelles — was under investigation. A statement from the civil aviation authority in the Seychelles attributed it to engine failure, saying that, after landing, the drone failed to stop before skidding into an outcropping of rocks at the end of the runway.
“It has been confirmed that this drone was unarmed and its failure was due to mechanical reasons,” the statement said. The Air Force confirmed that the MQ-9 was unarmed.