Drone crashes in Yemen’s Ma’rib: Witnesses, officials

An unmanned drone has crashed in the central Yemeni province of Ma’rib as Saudi warplanes keep pounding the crisis-hit Arabian Peninsula country.

A Yemeni witnesses and local officials said on Monday that the unmanned drone crashed in Wadi Abida, close to the city of Ma’rib.

The drone’s origin was not immediately known.

The incident came weeks after Yemen’s Ansarullah fighters captured a Saudi surveillance drone in the northwestern Yemeni province of Sa’ada. Yemen’s Arabic-language al-Masirah satellite television network reported that Yemeni forces targeted the remote-controlled unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) as it was flying over al-Dhaher district in the arid and mountainous province, which lies 240 kilometers (150 miles) north of the capital Sana’a.

On July 6, Yemeni army soldiers backed by Houthi Ansarullah fighters downed a Saudi UAV while conducting a surveillance mission in Sa’ada.

In early May, Ansarullah fighters took possession of a Saudi surveillance drone, which had parachute-landed in Sa’ada due to a technical glitch.