I saw one of those Alphas fly all by itself!

Problem was a bad battery, it checked out ok on an esv just before the first flight, but went dead when the test pilot advanced the throttle for takeoff. Got about 10 feet from him when the battery went dead.

The plane lifed off and climbed up about 75ft, turned right and did a nice 70 degree down kamakazi run into the ground. Luckly it missed the pits and hit the edge of the runway.

Considering how hard it hit, there was very little damage. Knocked out the firewall and broke off a bit on the side of the nose and peeled a bit of covering off. All it would need was a bit of epoxy, CA and an iron to fix.

Since it was a RTF, it was boxed up and sent back to Hanger 9 under warranty for a bad battery.

Tough plane!

Later!
Chuck.....