London, Apr.22 : The British Royal Air Force has blown up a 50 million pound spy plane after it crash landed in Afghanistan to prevent the Taliban from accessing its secrets.

The unmanned Reaper robot aircraft came down during a Special Forces mission.

According to The Sun, a team of SBS men was dropped in to the crash site by helicopter to salvage top-secret gear, including a high-intensity camera and computer memory chips.

Then an RAF Harrier jet was scrambled to blow up the Reaper with a laser-guided 1,000lb bomb.

The six-month-old Reaper, flown by a remote pilot, is thought to have had an "engine flame-out". It was landed in one piece in desert 200 miles south west of Kandahar.

Last year, the RAF bought three Reapers, guided via satellite by RAF Top Guns from a US Air Force base in Nevada.

They provide intelligence on enemy movements and pinpoint targets.

Six fixed-wing RAF planes have now been lost in Afghanistan and Iraq in just three years.

ANI