The Pentagon accidentally shot down a US Customs and Border Protection drone on the Texas border with Mexico using a high-energy laser, according to people familiar with the matter, weeks after a similar incident led to confusion and exposed communication lapses among several US agencies.
The Defense Department didn’t realize the drone was being flown by CBP when it shot it down, the people said. The military had not first coordinated the use of the laser system with the US Federal Aviation Administration, which was notified Wednesday after the event occurred, according to two of the people, who were granted anonymity to discuss it.
The FAA didn’t comment on the specific details of the episode but said in a statement Thursday evening that it already had temporary flight restrictions in place for the area around Fort Hancock in Texas. “The TFR has been expanded to include a greater radius to ensure safety,” the agency said, adding that because of the location of the restrictions, commercial flights are unaffected.
The agency’s notice on the restrictions cites “special security reasons” and says no pilots may enter the airspace, with some exclusions for medical emergencies and search and rescue. They are currently set to remain in effect into late June.
The Pentagon separately issued a joint statement late Thursday with the FAA and CBP that said the department “employed counter-unmanned aircraft system authorities to mitigate a seemingly threatening unmanned aerial system operating within military airspace.” The agencies said they would work on “increased cooperation and communication to prevent such incidents in the future.”
Heads ‘Exploding’
“Our heads are exploding over the news that DoD reportedly shot down a Customs and Border Protection drone using a high risk counter-unmanned aircraft system,” Democrats on the House Transportation and Infrastructure and Homeland Security Committees said in a statement Thursday night.
The lawmakers, including Representatives Rick Larsen, André Carson and Bennie Thompson, said the issues stem from a lack of appropriate training for counter-drone operators and poor coordination among the Pentagon, Department of Homeland Security and the FAA.
Under the law, the Pentagon has the authority to detect and mitigate threats from drones near sensitive military facilities and assets. But the military is supposed to coordinate counter-drone measures with the Transportation Department and the FAA beforehand if they might affect aviation safety or civilian operations. Two people familiar with the matter said that coordination hasn’t been taking place.
The CBP drone operators didn’t inform the military’s laser unit that it was launching, according to one official.
Earlier this month, the FAA temporarily closed the airspace near El Paso because of concerns over the use of the same laser system and the potential effects on civilian aircraft at El Paso International Airport.
The FAA imposed flight restrictions, which drew a backlash from local officials and were initially intended to last 10 days, on Feb. 10 but lifted them the following day.
Administration officials, including Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, said that closure occurred because drones flown by Mexican drug cartels had breached American airspace. Yet other people familiar with the situation said it was really because of the Department of Homeland Security’s operation of the Pentagon’s laser system without coordination with the FAA.
One of the people with knowledge of the latest event said the agencies are struggling to figure out how this could have happened so soon after the last incident.
The closure earlier this month and conflicting explanations for it created confusion as to what really happened, leading lawmakers in both the US House and Senate to request briefings.
Senator Tammy Duckworth of Illinois, the top Democrat on the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Aviation, Space, and Innovation, said she is requesting federal inquiries into the incidents.
“The situation is alarming and demands a thorough, independent investigation,” she said in a statement. “I will be calling on the Inspectors General of the Departments of Defense, Transportation and Homeland Security to launch a joint investigation into the recent scandals in El Paso and now Fort Hancock.”
The laser is the Army’s Locust system, manufactured by AeroVironment Inc.
Photo: The US-Mexico border wall on the outskirts of Eagle Pass, Texas. Photographer: Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP/Getty Images
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