Control Center for Unmanned Drone Aircraft

[Jenn]

Comment: Got this video, purporting to be a Taliban-kill from a Predator…controlled by a Nevada-based control center. True? Or just a product demo? Here’s the text that accompanied the clip:

'Missiles fired from Nevada controlled drone aircraft kill Taliban leader'. Watch how it's done. This information is no longer classified.

These controllers are at an Agency facility in Nevada and are each flying a drone thousands of miles away in the combat zone. The Predators are fueled, serviced and armed in Afghanistan by CIA technicians, but flown by Agency Controllers in the U.S. Their left hand is on the throttle controlling the drone's engine. Note all the buttons which perform various tasks without removing the hand from the throttle. The right hand is flying the plane. This is modern warfare.

[TrekkerScout]

Looks like a product demo to me. The explosion at the end smacks of CGI.

[Singing in the Drizzle]

Originally Posted by TrekkerScout

Looks like a product demo to me. The explosion at the end smacks of CGI.

Or a train simulator. Though from what I have seen on TV of the drone command stations, this does not look much different. I see no reason the real command stations could not be used for training and practice.

[jimmy101_again]

Originally Posted by TrekkerScout

Looks like a product demo to me. The explosion at the end smacks of CGI.

Me too. The car should have kept moving even after it was hit.

[ricco1]

I'd side with the "product demo" take on this too. The camera work looks too controlled, over-produced and smooth filtered to have been genuine live engagement footage, and I would agree that the impact on the truck is CGI.

[Malruhn]

At 1:38 they show the car making a left hand turn... and I swear to DOYC that it was TRON that did it... Holy 90-degree turns, Batman!!

Nope - this whole thing was CGI.

[UEL]

It looks exactly like a simulation for a proof of concept demonstration. I've seen them before, and there are some material things missing to be considered a "training scenario".

Mind you, their simulations are much better than the hours and hours of simulation I had to do for our aircraft.

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

I'm going to pick on a different aspect of the email....

Originally Posted by Jenn

'Missiles fired from Nevada controlled drone aircraft kill Taliban leader'. Watch how it's done. This information is no longer classified.

I can't imagine how something that purportedly happened in the last couple of years in an active war zone would be declassified so quickly.

[UEL]

Originally Posted by Dr. Winston O'Boogie

I can't imagine how something that purportedly happened in the last couple of years in an active war zone would be declassified so quickly.

It happens all the time. DesertRat and I had a discussion on classification and the tendency to overclassify material. One point we discussed was declassification and in my experience, it does not take long.

For example, in the first Gulf War, we were being shown images of precision strikes within hours of the event. During recent operations in Afghanistan, images of firefights are shown within weeks of the actual events (several recent documentaries have had relatively fresh imagery).

If this was what it said it was, it is not unlikely that it has been declassified. However, I believe it is a proof of concept trainer.

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

Originally Posted by UEL

It happens all the time. DesertRat and I had a discussion on classification and the tendency to overclassify material. One point we discussed was declassification and in my experience, it does not take long.

For example, in the first Gulf War, we were being shown images of precision strikes within hours of the event. During recent operations in Afghanistan, images of firefights are shown within weeks of the actual events (several recent documentaries have had relatively fresh imagery).

If this was what it said it was, it is not unlikely that it has been declassified. However, I believe it is a proof of concept trainer.

I stand corrected.

[Ulkomaalainen]

Quite certainly only a simulation. The immediate stopping, explosion and the TRON turn have been mentioned already, plus there is no movement apart from the target on the satellite images, and the camera follows way too precise anyway.