A military surveillance blimp worth more than $1 billion crash-landed in central Pennsylvania on Wednesday just hours after it broke loose from its tether in Maryland.
Real Gasbag, but not “the real” gasbag
The crash took out power to a nearby school.
The unmanned aircraft, one of two JLENS, or Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor Systems that have been surveying the East Coast, came detached around noon while hovering at an altitude of 16,000 feet, according to the Baltimore Sun.
The real Gasbag
Students at Columbia-Montour Area Vocational-Technical School in Bloomsburg, Pa. tweeted that they saw the blimp go down near the school.
“It knocked out the power. When we went outside it was going down on the other side of the building,” tweeted Fisher P. Creasy, a student who posted a video of the blimp around 1:30 p.m.
“Omg literally crying that a `lost’ blimp crashed into our power source and gave us a power outage,” wrote Darian Brenner.
Sometimes you know your luck is on a roll (rolling boulder pun intended) and it’s your day to play the lotto, head for the track, or find a nice dry seat in front of a slot machine. ‘Cause you are a winner today!
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