Embarrassing. I can imagine the "Benny Hill" theme playing during this whole event. It sounds like a massive fuck-up by multiple parties, particularly whoever made that missile system and the drone control hardware. I wonder how many billions of dollars of taxpayer money was spent to acquire those cutting-edge weapons systems, only to be defeated by a busted dummy target.
I'm surprised no-one tried to flip the drone with his wings, as Spitfires did to V-1 bombs in WWII: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Interceptors" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-1_flying_bomb#Interceptors</a>
> The attackers attempted to fire in automatic mode several times, but due to a design flaw in the fire control system the rockets failed to launch.<p>I'm really curious about this design flaw. Has anyone read the book the page cites ("X Plane Crashes") that can fill in more detail?
Most of actual firing seemed to happen over what is now the city of Santa Clarita. The "Bermite" mentioned in the wiki made munitions during WWII, and was still making rocket fuel when I was kid in the late 80's. Catching that on fire would have been bad news.