James48
James48's JournalNavy MQ-4C Triton's Fate Unknown After Disappearing From Flight Tracking Over Persian Gulf
Source: TWZ
(This is a new $238 million dollar drone)
U.S. Navy MQ-4C Triton surveillance drone disappeared abruptly and unexpectedly from online flight tracking sites after declaring an in-flight emergency while flying over the Persian Gulf today. The uncrewed aircraft was also tracked rapidly losing altitude right beforehand, prompting widespread questions about its fate. This comes just two days after the United States and Iran agreed to a still very fragile ceasefire, which is heavily contingent on the reopening of the highly strategic Strait of Hormuz.
Online flight tracking data shows the MQ-4C had just completed a roughly three-hour-long flight over the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz and appeared to be returning to base at Naval Air Station Sigonella in Italy. The online tracking shows the Triton had just crossed into Saudi Arabian airspace before making a sudden turn to the northeast in the direction of Iran. Available data also shows the drone rapidly descended from a typical cruising altitude of around 50,000 feet down to below 10,000 feet.
U.S. Navy MQ-4C Triton surveillance drone disappeared abruptly and unexpectedly from online flight tracking sites after declaring an in-flight emergency while flying over the Persian Gulf today. The uncrewed aircraft was also tracked rapidly losing altitude right beforehand, prompting widespread questions about its fate. This comes just two days after the United States and Iran agreed to a still very fragile ceasefire, which is heavily contingent on the reopening of the highly strategic Strait of Hormuz.
Online flight tracking data shows the MQ-4C had just completed a roughly three-hour-long flight over the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz and appeared to be returning to base at Naval Air Station Sigonella in Italy. The online tracking shows the Triton had just crossed into Saudi Arabian airspace before making a sudden turn to the northeast in the direction of Iran. Available data also shows the drone rapidly descended from a typical cruising altitude of around 50,000 feet down to below 10,000 feet.
Read more: https://www.twz.com/air/navy-mq-4c-tritons-fate-unknown-after-disappearing-from-flight-tracking-over-persian-gulf
Well, there goes another quarter billion dollars - in one go.
Trump says God supports U.S. cause in Iran war as he threatens wider bombing
Source: Washington Post
As President Donald Trump renews his threats to bomb “the entire country” of Iran, he is offering a new justification for the costly five-week conflict with no clear end in sight: God himself wants the United States to do it.
Trump said Monday that he believed God supports the United States’ actions in the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran, a widening conflict that has killed thousands in the Middle East, wounded many more and left 13 U.S. service members dead.
“I do, because God is good,” Trump said in response to a Washington Post reporter’s question during a White House news briefing. “And God wants to see people taken care of.”
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2026/04/06/trump-iran-war-christianity/
He’s nuts.
Report from "No Kings" rally, Cheboygan, Michigan , population 4,770
Red area- but today we had 150 energetic protestors holding signs and flags.
These are my people. I have found them.
At least 10 U.S. troops wounded in Iranian attack on Saudi air base
Source: Washington Post
At least 10 U.S. troops were injured Friday, two seriously, in an Iranian attack on Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia, according to U.S. officials familiar with the matter.
The strike on the heavily defended base also damaged at least two U.S. Air Force refueling aircraft, the officials said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the incident with the news media. It was not immediately clear how badly the planes were damaged.
Iran has hit numerous U.S. facilities throughout the region since hostilities began Feb. 28, and more than 300 U.S. troops have been wounded, according to the Pentagon’s latest tally. Most of the injured have returned to duty, though at least 10 troops remain seriously hurt, an official said.
To date, 13 American service members have been killed as a result of Operation Epic Fury, the Trump administration’s name for its war on Iran. Seven died as a result of hostile fire. Six were killed in a plane crash.
Read more: https://wapo.st/4dykZqj
Full article:
https://wapo.st/4dykZqj
'No practical use': TSA experts say Trump's ICE deployments won't help with airport security
Source: GovExec.com
President Trump will beginning Monday shift Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel to airports to provide security there in a move he said will alleviate long lines created by shutdown-induced callouts but which experienced TSA officials said would have minimal impact.
The unusual approach comes as Trump administration officials have repeatedly lamented that Transportation Security Administration employees are calling out and quitting the agency due to the shutdown’s impact on paychecks, lengthening wait times at many airports around the country. Details of the assignments were not clear as of Sunday, despite Trump declaring that the airport deployments would occur on Monday. Tom Homan, the White House’s border czar, told CNN on Sunday that he was “working on the plan” and would come up with one soon.
Several current and former TSA officials told Government Executive that ICE personnel will be limited in what they can accomplish at airports, as they will not have the requisite training to check identification, examine luggage x-rays or provide other key security services. TSA employees go through classroom and on-the-job training before they can staff those roles, the officials said.
“It serves no practical use,” said one former official with decades of federal experience who declined to be named out of fear of professional reprisal. “It's a political, publicity action, not a practical solution.”
Read more: https://www.govexec.com/management/2026/03/no-practical-use-tsa-experts-say-trumps-ice-deployments-wont-help-airport-security/412298/?oref=ge-home-top-story
TSA experts think it’s a worthless sideshow.
Judge orders VA to restore collective bargaining
Source: GovExec.com
A federal judge in Rhode Island on Friday issued a preliminary injunction ordering the Veterans Affairs Department to reinstate its contract with the American Federation of Government Employees, ruling that the department’s implementation of President Trump’s executive order ousting unions from most federal agencies violated both the First Amendment and the Administrative Procedures Act.
AFGE’s lawsuit, filed last November, zeroes in on the VA’s actions to implement President Trump’s March 2025 executive order, which cites a seldom-used provision of the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act to strip two-thirds of the federal workforce of their collective bargaining rights on national security grounds, specifically the April 2025 decision to exempt some smaller unions from the edict and the termination last August of AFGE’s union contract, when the Office of Personnel Management was still advising agencies to refrain from terminating CBAs until the conclusion of litigation.
U.S. District Judge Melissa DuBose, a Biden appointee, cited reporting from Government Executive in which the VA justified exempting a smattering of smaller unions from the executive order’s provisions because they, unlike AFGE, had “posed no or minimal hinderance to VA operations” in considering the union’s claim that they were retaliated against for First Amendment activity. VA Secretary Doug Collins rescinded those exemptions two days after AFGE filed its lawsuit.
Read more: https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2026/03/judge-orders-va-restore-collective-bargaining/412123/
VA has to honor contracts. Let’s see if they do.
GOP Loses Carroll County Seat in Special Election Upset
Source: New Hampshire Journal
In what Granite State Republicans hope is not a preview of November, Democrat Bobbi Boudman won Tuesday’s special election for Carroll County District 7, defeating Republican Dale Fincher 51 percent to 47 percent in a district that voted Republican by more than 13 points just 16 months ago.
Boudman received 2,207 votes to Fincher’s 2,043 out of 4,331 ballots cast across Ossipee, Tuftonboro, and Wolfeboro.
The result immediately drew national-style spin from Democrats.
“Bad day for the NHGOP,” posted state Democratic Party communications staffer Marissa Hebert. “Boudman lost her race in 2024 in this same district by 13.6 points. Tonight she won by 2.4 points. A 16-point swing from 2024.”
Read more: https://nhjournal.com/gop-loses-carroll-county-seat-in-special-election-upset/?fbclid=IwRlRTSAQeL15leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEeYthLR51U1weOPVVTqQcKQmUP_45UFuwJi1OH7VMv5pSxy-GZRAD16MZmRqk_aem_kYdqFSliJPu23fY1vjaaxQ
Democrat in New Hampshire House race flips district- by 16% different than 2024.
That’s a heck of a flip!!! Congrats!
US may not have capacity to take down full barrage of Iranian drones, officials warn
Source: The Guardian
Top military officials told lawmakers in a closed door briefing on Tuesday that they may not be able to shoot down every Iranian drone being launched against US military installations and assets in retaliatory attacks, according to two people familiar with the matter.
The officials, led by the chair of the joint chiefs of staff, Gen Dan Caine, said Iran has been deploying thousands of one-way attack drones and while they have capacity to take down the vast majority but not all of the barrage.
As a result, the officials said in a classified briefing for lawmakers on Capitol Hill, the US was focused on destroying the launch sites for the drones and conventional missiles as quickly as possible. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.
In retaliation against US strikes, Iran has been launching its low-cost, one-way attack Shahed drones. By flying low and slow, the drones are seen to be better able to evade conventional air defenses than ballistic missiles.
A senior administration official said Iran’s apparent drone strategy – to get the US to sacrifice its most sophisticated Patriot and Thaad interceptors – was misguided and unsuccessful because the US has been downing the drones with several different measures.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/04/us-interceptors-iranian-drones
Trump said we have unlimited ammo. The Joint Chiefs say we are shooting down $20,000 drones with $4 million missiles, and will be running out soon.
US submarine sinks Iranian warship as conflict spreads beyond Middle East
Source: The Guardian
Update: 87 Bodies recovered, still around 70 missing. Only 32 survivors of the Iranian frigate sunk this morning by a U.S. Submarine off Sri Lanka.
A torpedo fired by a US submarine sank an Iranian warship off the south coast of Sri Lanka as the Trump administration followed through on its threats to destroy Tehran’s military and political leadership. At least 87 Iranian sailors were killed in the attack on the Iris Dena on Wednesday. The frigate was sailing in international waters as it returned from a naval exercise organised by India in the Bay of Bengal. The torpedo strike prompted questions from former US officials about whether Washington’s aim of eliminating all of Iran’s military breached international law.
The incident came as the US-Israeli air assault on Iran continued for a fifth day, with Washington officials warning that strikes would soon hit targets “deeper” in Iran. US forces also targeted pro-Iranian militias in Iraq, while the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) announced that it would continue missile and drone strikes on targets throughout the Middle East.
Pete Hegseth, the ex-Fox News host now leading the Pentagon as defence secretary, confirmed that the US sank the Iris Dena as it sailed close to the Sri Lankan coast. The Pentagon released black-and-white footage of a Mark 48 heavyweight torpedo striking the frigate, sending a geyser of seawater into the air. “ An American submarine sank an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters,” Hegseth said. He said the attack was carried out late on Tuesday night.
“It was sunk by a torpedo, a quiet death – the first sinking of an enemy ship by a torpedo since World War II,” added Hegseth. “Like in that war, back when we were still the war department, we are fighting to win.”
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/mar/04/us-submarine-torpedo-iran-warship-sri-lanka-coast-pete-hegseth
There is a video at the link of the actual torpedo strike on the ship.
Extensive article about the attack and body recovery taking place.
This is an update to earlier reports- this one includes a more substantial death toll.
Pentagon identifies four of the Army Reserve troops killed Sunday in Kuwait
Source: Stars and Stripes
The Defense Department has identified four Army Reserve soldiers who died in Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. and Israeli campaign against Iran: • Capt. Cody A. Khork, 35, of Winter Haven, Fla. • Sgt. 1st Class Noah L. Tietjens, 42, Bellevue, Nebraska, Sgt. 1st Class Nicole M. Amor, 39, of White Bear Lake, Minn. • Sgt. Declan J. Coady, 20, of West Des Moines, Iowa. The soldiers died Sunday in Port Shuaiba, Kuwait, during an unmanned aircraft system attack, according to a Pentagon news release Tuesday. All four were assigned to the 103rd Sustainment Command, Des Moines, Iowa. The incident is under investigation.
Read more: https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2026-03-03/army-reserve-troops-identified-20942573.html
They were Army Reserve members.
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