Airports across Britain have been warned to look out for a UFO - unusual flying object - which is expected to float erratically round the country for at least the next four days.
Thirteen feet long and worth £15,000, the rogue flying machine is a solar-powered "fly borg" from the Magna science centre in Yorkshire, where it normally takes part in robot wars staged for audiences of up to 500 people.
Equipped with a small but well-practised computer "brain", which allows it to avoid obstacles, the flyborg looks like a wartime blimp and is filled with helium gas.
A spokesman for Magna said it broke free while two technical staff were moving it from workshops to a display.
"The two technicians held on to its gondola but they couldn't cope with a strong gust of wind which tore the airship out of their hands," he said.
There are now fears that the robot poses a risk to other aircraft.
"We immediately contacted the unmanned balloons and blimps section of the national air traffic service in London," the spokesman said.
The flyborg, which is made of lightweight polymer, may be blown further afield by strong winds; it is calculated to have four days of airworthiness before its blimp deflates.
It normally takes part in daily struggles with other "intelligent robots" which test the Darwinian theory of the survival of the fittest by trying to steal one another's electric power.
The only previous escape from the colony, which is being "bred" by Professor Noel Sharkey, of Sheffield university and the TV series Robot Wars, involved a wheeled robot which slipped out of an open door.
It managed to get across the busy car park at the former steelworks in Rotherham, but was run over at the entrance by a car.

Don't tell me you've been watching Terminator again Doug?

Mark

I thought it was a joke at first... ...I had to read it again to make sure it wasn't.

Do these robots use AI?  Because why else would a robot just "slip out the door"?  Run little robot, run as fas-  Ouch!

I was talking about the wheeled robot.