[Doglips]

LONDON (Reuters) - The British Army appealed on Monday for anyone hiding one if its borrowed inflatable tanks -- which blew away in a weekend gale -- to kindly return it.

"If anyone has seen a flying tank please contact us. We would like it back," Army spokesman David Webb told Reuters from breezy Wales.

"We borrowed six of the inflatable tanks from the Royal Air Force and would very much like to give six back to them. At the moment we only have five."

The dummy tank, which takes three men to handle, was being used in an exercise involving troops from Britain, the United States, Canada, Belgium and Poland high in the Brecon Beacon mountains.

The annual exercise is supposed to give troops a feel of what it is like to operate patrols deep behind enemy lines.

Inflatable tanks and artillery pieces are staked out in various locations for the patrols to find. Not only are they less lethal than their real life counterparts, they do less damage to the countryside.

However, the violent gales that swept Britain at the weekend killing several people and causing widespread damage also took the tank with them.

"It just took off and hasn't been seen since," Webb said.

"They are very realistic from a distance and hard to miss. But by now it might have been punctured so it would look more like a giant tarpaulin than a tank."

[Big Dog]

My British-born co-worker will get a kick out of this!

[taras]

The British eh? If it has a hole in it and won't float they probably sold it to our navy like they did the bargain basement sub!