How Did Hezbollah's Drone Evade a Patriot Missile?

[Purveyor]

By David Hambling
Jul 29, 2016

Israel's air defenses, equipped with U.S. Patriot PAC-2 surface-to-air missiles, are among the best in the world. Yet earlier this month they failed to shoot down a drone intruder. What happened? And what does it mean for the future?

On July 17, an unmanned aircraft crossed the border from Syria into the Golan Heights, setting off Israeli air raid sirens. "The aircraft was detected prior to entering the nation's territory and was fully tracked," according to a statement from the IDF.

Not long after the unidentified drone came over the border, the IDF tweeted:

IDF ✔ @IDFSpokesperson
Moments ago, Patriot Air Defense missiles fired towards a #drone infiltrating Israeli airspace from #Syria
10:32 AM - 17 Jul 2016
315 315 Retweets 275 275 likes

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It is not clear whether the missiles were fired sequentially or at the same time. (Sometimes Israel will fire two missiles simultaneously but on different trajectories to guarantee a hit.) This is not the first incursion from across the Syrian border, and Israel has shot down previous intruding drones, as well as others from Gaza. The Patriot missile is good at its job.

This time, though, the missiles failed to bring down the target (watch video of missile smoke trail here). One of the missiles did detonate mid-air. According to the Jerusalem Post, a 14-year-old girl was slightly injured by falling shrapnel. Israel then made another interception attempt, this one most likely by an F-16 firing an air-to-air missile at the drone. The details are not available, but we know this missile also missed. The drone later crossed back over the border to Syria.

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http://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/drones/a22114/hezbollah-drone-israel-patriot-missile/

[deathrind]

1. Interesting.

[Agnosticsherbet]

2. It means that technology changes constantly, and Interceptor missiles have to be improved.

[6chars]

4. using high tech from russia and iran

possibly stolen from israel or u.s.

maybe this means that Hezbollah will finally liberate Jerusalem and Tel Aviv and Hezbollah and Iran will bring Peace to the World.

[guillaumeb]

5. What is most interresting to me is that the Golan Heights

is actually located in Syria, but the story treats the heights as Israeli territory. The Golan Heights were stolen from Syria by the Israelis and have been occupied ever since.

[6chars]

6. If only Assad's forces or ISIS were there

What a wonderful world it would be.

[hack89]

7. I suspect the drone was not big enough to properly trigger the warhead fuse

there is not a lot of metal in most drones so getting a good radar return can be difficult.