blimpminiMUNCY, Pa. (AP) – A military official says it will take days, maybe weeks, to remove a surveillance blimp that broke loose in Maryland before coming down into trees in the Pennsylvania countryside.
 
     U.S. Army Captain Matthew Villa says the blimp is in two “mostly intact” pieces. The main body and the tail section are a few hundred meters apart.
 
     He says the wreckage is in trees along a ravine in a hard-to-access area. He spoke at a briefing Thursday morning, a day after the 240-foot helium-filled blimp came to a rest near Muncy.
 
     Villa says the “hows and whys” of what happened are under investigation.
 
     The blimp, fitted with sensitive defense technology, escaped from Aberdeen Proving Ground. Its dangling tether caused power outages in Pennsylvania before it hit the ground.

 

Previously…
 

WASHINGTON  (AP)    Pennsylvania state police say a military blimp that broke loose in Maryland and drifted over Pennsylvania is on the ground and secure.
 
     Bob Reese, a state police spokesman in Montoursville, says it came down in the area of Muncy, near Williamsport.
 
     The blimp caused about 18,000 power outages. Columbia County chief clerk Gail Kipp says the blimp dragged its tether line, which took out power lines and caused widespread outages.
 
     The unmanned Army surveillance blimp broke loose from its ground tether at a military base and drifted over central Pennsylvania as fighter jets tracked it. The aircraft is known as a Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System and can be used as part of a missile defense system.
 
     It’s not clear how the blimp came loose.

Previously…

WASHINGTON (AP) – Fox News reports,  Wednesday afternoon, U.S. fighter jets have been tracking an unmanned Army surveillance blimp that tore loose from its ground tether in Maryland and drifted north over Pennsylvania. The jets from a New Jersey base are monitoring the blimp, which is headed north at an altitude of about 16,000 feet. FAA officials are working with the military to make sure air traffic isn’t threatened. The blimp can be used as part of a missile defense system.