Defense Ministry drone sinks again due to engine trouble

TOKYO, July 24 Kyodo -
A drone developed at a cost of 2.5 billion yen sank at sea off Iwoto Island
during a flight test Friday after engine trouble, following another drone
sinking in February, the Defense Ministry said Saturday.
The ministry's Technical Research and Development Institute said the engine of
the drone, developed as a reconnaissance aircraft, stopped shortly before 9:30
a.m. Friday after it went on a test flight from the Maritime Self-Defense Force
base on the island, about 1,200 kilometers south of Tokyo.
The institute made the plane go down at sea about 9 km off the island by remote
control about 2 minutes later for safety reasons, it said.
While the drone was carrying capsulated radioactive material called Krypton-85,
it will not harm the environment as it would not affect human health even if a
person swallowed all of the carried material, it said.
Among the four drones developed by the ministry, two have already been lost,
with the first one costing 800 million yen.
==Kyodo