Thread: US border drone patrols short staffed, accident prone

US border drone patrols short staffed, accident prone

(AFP) – 9 hours ago

WASHINGTON — The US-Mexico border monitoring program with remotely operated drone aircraft begun five years ago is short staffed and accident prone, officials and lawmakers told a hearing in Congress Thursday.

Training the pilot-operators for UAVs, or unmanned aerial vehicle, "has proven difficult at a time when similar aircraft are being used in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Texas Democratic Representative Henry Cuellar.

"There is a significant amount of competition among the DoD (Department of Defense) and DHS (Department of Homeland Security) to hire UAV pilots," added Customs and Border Protection (CBP) assistant commissioner Michael Kostelnik.

The United States currently has four drones patrolling the border with Mexico in Arizona and one in the northern border with Canada in the state of North Dakota. Two more have been requested this year for the Texas-Mexico border.

The drones assist border patrols in controlling illegal immigration and drug trafficking across the border. The patrols were also reinforced recently with 1,000 additional agents and 60 investigators.

Congress last year authorized only 24 additional "pilot" operators for the drone program and none at all for fiscal 2011, which begins October 1, Kostelnik said.

Drone aircraft are also accident prone, lawmakers were told.

"Accident rates for UAVs are higher than in general aviation," said Federal Aviation Administration vice president for system operations Nancy Kalinowski.

She said the CBP has reported 52.7 drone accidents per 100,000 hours of flight time, seven times the civil aviation accident rate of 7.11 per 100,000 hours.

"While many view UAVs as a promising new technology," Kalinowski told lawmakers, "the limited safety and operational data available does not support expedited or full integration into the national airspace system."

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More intentional waste by the government to prevent border enforcement. One drone "system" costs ten times more than a light manned aircraft which could do the same job. Here in CA the Highway Patrol uses manned light aircraft for their cost and mission effectiveness. So of course the federal government prefers drones which are only 1/10th as effective.