A Navy Global Hawk remotely piloted aircraft crashed on June 11 near Maryland’s Bloodsworth Island in the Chesapeake Bay, approximately 22 miles east of NAS Patuxent River, Md., announced the sea service. The Broad Area Maritime Surveillance Demonstrator airplane went down at approximately 12:11 p.m. US East Coast time, according to the Navy’s release. No one was injured and there was no property damage at the unpopulated swampy crash site, said Navy officials. A Navy F/A-18 fighter made visual confirmation of the crash, they said. Navy and regional authorities quickly responded to the crash scene. Cleanup of the site is underway, they said. Navy officials are investigating the cause of the crash. The mishap BAMS-D was one of the Global Hawk Block 10 aircraft that the Navy acquired from the Air Force last year after USAF retired them. BAMS-D aircraft are supporting the development of the Navy’s MQ-4C BAMS fleet.
While U.S. defense officials have spent much of the past decade warning that China is the nation’s pacing threat and its People’s Liberation Army represents an urgent threat in the Indo-Pacific, several defense researchers are skeptical that the PLA has the human capital, the structural ability, or the political appetite…