Sometimes new players ask why people would attack their shuttle.
Shuttles are cheap, cannot fight, so why kill them?
Here’s the thing: sometimes people use shuttles to carry valuable pod implants, or other valuables.
Do not move your valuables in your shuttles, they are easily destroyed. And if you ever get the chance to shoot a shuttle, here is a good reason to shoot one:
RIP
Most Shuttles align into warp quickly enough to not be targeted… I’d say the actual problem is using Autopilot which dumps you 15 km’s away from gate to then slow-boat towards it, basically turning the ship into a large target…
Autopilot is great for setting route path… However in order to be safer, the pilot should do all jumps manually instead of automatically…
EDIT:
Yeah, just looked at that KM… Should have used a cloaked Blockade Runner fit for agility and speed, especially in Low or Null Sec space…
What the actual… how the… why the…
Just, wow.
I’d never move that much at once and certainly not in a shuttle.
Good advice, but I very much doubt this shuttle was auto-piloted.
Also you do not need to target a shuttle to kill it. Much easier is to smartbomb the shuttle while it lands out of warp, which is what happened here.
Either because dumb or RMT. 
Not RMT.
In this case it’s just a dumb action as result of being under stress that their keepstar and most of their other valuables are on fire and completely surrounded by bubbles and a hostile fleet.
A shuttle with blueprints probably was one of the few things that could still get out.
Smartbomb AoE damage is quick with a relatively short range… Player had to be right on top of them…
Anyway, at first I thought that was a High Sec kill until I actually looked at the KM, then added the edit to my post…
Looks like he got caught in jump range on the out gate, so not APing. That system is in a pipe so it’s very obvious and easy to catch people travelling through it unless they prepared well (but that would take effort so totally not worth doing if you’re moving 100’s of billions).
Get out of the direct fray and log off, wait a few days to avoid the sharks in the water. That dude was just dumb.
You are right, smartbombs do have short range.
Such a smartbomb camp is therefore easily avoided if you do not warp straight from gate to gate on the predictable path with your shuttle. If you instead warp to a celestial and warp in from another angle you will likely be out of range of the smartbomber on the gate.
This also applies to smartbombers in high sec by the way.
lmao 
Still could be RMT.
A perfect cover up in opposition with the Jita ones which seem rather obvious, but also have space for doubt. Naturally the more obvious they do it the more easy for CCP to see it and punish anyone partaking in it. Maybe this was just a good opportunity for it or maybe they were just dumb.
If you wrote “most likely not RMT” I could agree but categorically stating without factual evidence that it was 100% not is just wrong. You might think it wasn’t, and it might be true, but you don’t know for 100% certainty.
well this was someone from pan horde… and with everything going on with them….
Fair!
“Most likely not RMT” then. 
Agreed.
One of the biggest drawbacks of shuttles is their fixed warp speed. There are multiple video tutorials around that tell you how to exploit that fact to reliably kill almost all shuttles moving around. Therefore, even if you use celestials or ping spots, such a smartbomb camp in between gates gets you killed.
Nope. Using celestials makes it even easier to avoid such a mid-warp smartbomber.
The smartbomber has to be exactly in the right spot between two gates to smartbomb you mid-warp. If you ping to a celestial your path will be different so they cannot smartbomb you then.
Bouncing to celestials works against both gate smartbombers and mid-warp smartbombers.
Oh, this happened today. At first I thought it was some old killmail. People don’t use asset safety?
Anyway. Even if you ping to a celestial it’s not 100% given you will not get killed. Smartbombers are usually as close to a gate as they can be to maximize the AoE coverage against targets. You have to actually look at the map and choose a celestial that is as close from the opposite direction from gate-to-gate as possible in order to avoid landing in the AoE.
If you absolutely need to carry 200b worth of stuff in a shuttle – in low sec – you should warp to 200k from gate first – and if you see smartbombers on it, you should just safe log for a couple of days. But I understand that’s too much common sense for some people.
AFAIK Asset safety is just for structures. Since this is a pop can in transit, there is no game mechanic to cover your loss. I do some long runs in a shuttle, they work, as long as you know what you are doing. I have managed to use Bestower, Miasmos, and Tayra for contract hauls too. I assume some players think they are bound by the auto route. I plot my route through HS as much as possible. I never use Ahbazon as part of my route, avoid Miroitem like the plague, and other pirate choke points.
Plan to travel in the low population, wait for the ebb in gankers. Since that is not a contract haul they could have broken it up in several trips across a LS system, but I would have used an alternate route. Long story made short, looks like someone got impatient.
what do u recommend transporting 260 billion in?
Hmmm.