Friday, December 16, 2016

BREAKING: Chinese Navy Seizes US Underwater Drone



A Chinese Navy warship has seized an underwater drone deployed by an American oceanographic vessel in international waters in the South China Sea, triggering a formal demarche from the United States and a demand for its return, a U.S. defense official told Reuters on Friday.

The drone was about 500 yards from the USNS Bowditch,"an oceanographic survey vessel." The U.S. ship contacted the Chinese ship and asked for the drone, which collects unclassified data, but the Chinese ship, which had brought the glider aboard, left the area, according to the Washington Post.

UPDATE

The South China Sea is a marginal sea that is part of the Pacific Ocean, encompassing an area from the Karimata and Malacca Straits to the Strait of Taiwan of around 3,500,000 square kilometers. (via Wikipedia)

Click on map to enlarge.

Also see: Understanding Great Powers Politics in the South China Sea

1 comment:

  1. I was once on one of these oceanographic vessels. Another one, the USNS Mary Sears, since we won a marine science contest in high school and they let us spend a week with them in the Gulf of Mexico. There is a drone they use to survey the ocean floor, as far as I know there is no military use to such drones, though who the hell knows, maybe there's some secret use for it. it's used to survey the floor with sonar and stuff.

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