Unmanned planes could begin flying over Texas in a matter of months

[kpete]

Source: American Statesman

Unmanned planes could begin flying over Texas in a matter of months
FAA says it's working on approval that would allow the flights.
Predator drones can spot illegal activity and send images in real time to border officials, who can then be dispatched.
Ross D. Franklin/2007 ASSOCIATED PRESS

After years of political pressure from Texas politicians, U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar said Monday that he expects the federal government to deliver unmanned aircraft to watch over the border with Mexico by this fall.

Cuellar, a Democrat from Laredo, said he has had discussions with top officials from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection's office of air and marine operations, and they agreed to the timetable, subject to Federal Aviation Administration approval to allow the surveillance planes — often referred to in the political vernacular as "Predator drones" — to fly over Texas.

Laura Brown, an FAA spokeswoman, said the administration is "working as quickly as we can on this."

Cuellar said the FAA told him that regulators' main concern has been with Texas' heavy airplane traffic — both private and commercial.

Read more: http://www.statesman.com/news/texas-politics/unmanned-planes-could-begin-flying-over-texas-in-681019.html

[havocmom]

1. Uncle Jim was an aeronautic engineer. He died in 67, and his favorite joke was on this subject

Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome aboard (airline which no longer exists) flight 2290. We will be cruising at 33,000 feet to our destination, and the weather looks great.

Your stewardesses will be along with refreshments after we have achieved cruising altitude. Please be advised that they are the only live airline employees on this flight. Yes, through the advances of science and engineering, this flight is completely automated. No human errors are possible.

Have a good flight, relax, nothing could go wrong

go wrong

go wrong

go wrong

[n2doc]

7. The movie "Westworld" ends that way as well n/t

[havocmom]

8. Yep. Thought of Uncle Jim when I watched that the first time.

Somebody on that movie heard the joke ;)

[Gidney N Cloyd]

2. Next: Rover Balloons.

[CLANG]

3. Why not take them out with a hellfire missile?

[sinkingfeeling]

4. Wonder when the Tea Party will organize a massive protest of this intrusive governmental

surveillance of people living along the border?

[happygoluckytoyou]

5. bombs? could we get them armed? huh? could we? huh? with bombs and stuff? tell me about the rabbits

[ShortnFiery]

6. How soon before they hunt down American Citizen "suspects?"

Stop the drone executions overseas lest you wish to see THE EVIL come to USA? :scared:

[havocmom]

9. How long before some aggrieved people from Afghanistan or Pakistan come here

and hack into the controls.

Frankly, I think current policies are creating more potential terrorists than we are eliminating.

[No Elephants]

14. "Shahzad reportedly told investigators that he was angry about U.S. predator drone strikes in

Pakistan." http://wcbstv.com/local/times.square.suspicious.2.1683550.html

[EFerrari]

10. We're getting there at a good clip.n/t

[Kelvin Mace]

11. Why bother informing the border patrol

We can just gun them down without trial, as we do NOW in Afghanistan.

[rocktivity]

12. Thus sending us down the slippery slope to arming them

x(
rocktivity

[Mudoria]

13. Appears to be an excellent use of resources