White House Drone Crash Is Tied to Drinking by Intelligence Worker
Source: NY Times
By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT and MICHAEL D. SHEAR
WASHINGTON A man who says he operated a drone that crashed on the White House grounds early Monday is an employee of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, according to law enforcement officials. He told Secret Service investigators that he had been drinking at an apartment nearby before he lost control of the craft, the officials said.
The man told investigators that he went to bed despite fearing that the drone had flown over the White House. After friends told him about news reports on the drone Monday morning, he contacted the authorities.
The drone, which was about two feet in diameter and weighed about two pounds, belonged to a friend, the man said.
A spokesman for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which is based at Fort Belvoir, Va., declined to comment.
FULL story at link.
The drone that landed on the White House's South Lawn. Credit U.S. Secret Service
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/28/us/white-house-drone.html?_r=0
KamaAina
(78,249 posts)Droning Under the Influence.
Mothers against drunk droning
bigworld
(1,807 posts)You can almost ALWAYS bet that drinking was involved.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)in a drunken stupor. I think the Fed Guidelines about working 24/7 might have something to do with that....but, then, what we don't know about this is probably revealed much later.
tridim
(45,358 posts)CYA is so easy these days, just say you are drunk or stupid and everything will be okay.
AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)former9thward
(32,077 posts)He has civil service protection. He is SO NOT fired.
AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)At the least he'll be promoted to the maximum level of his incompetence.
lark
(23,155 posts)Fire the drunken asshole!
snooper2
(30,151 posts)PoliticAverse
(26,366 posts)Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)The kind drunk drivers have on their cars.
jmowreader
(50,562 posts)That's one of those little model-airplane drones they sell at places like Walmart and Best Buy, not a government-style drone. The smallest drone the government uses is the RQ-11 Raven, which is a fixed-wing aircraft that looks like a moderate-size model airplane. (Actually, I think it IS a moderate-size model airplane.)
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)know anything much about them. Don't you have some sort of little hand-held control console (or iPhone app or something) that you use to control it?
jmowreader
(50,562 posts)"Console" is really overstating the case here. It's more like what you'd use to drive a radio-controlled car or something. And there are some drones that use an iPhone to control them.
This is what a Predator's control console looks like...
This is an Army Shadow UAV console...
When you say "console" all the Military Intelligence stuff comes back and I start thinking in terms of "you need a box truck to haul it and two hours to emplace it."
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)how one snarky remark can launch a whole off-topic debate on the exact meaning of a word like "console."
I'll probly have to take a snack break now to console myself over having been sucked in here.
jberryhill
(62,444 posts)Lionel Mandrake
(4,076 posts)His job has nothing to do with his droning accident.
William Seger
(10,779 posts)... and apparently hasn't been working hard enough.
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)in any agency that has "Intelligence" in its name.
Nitram
(22,877 posts)Capable of carrying a Go-Pro video camera. Pretty sophisticated, as it uses GPS to hover even in a wind, or return automatically if the link to the controller is lost. However, an environment with steel reinforced buildings can interfere with the radio-control and GPS signals.
ladjf
(17,320 posts)simply by watching it. Many such helicopters now have forward viewing on board video cameras which can be used for navigation.
However, it would a very skilled operator to fly that copter around town in the dark while using the on board camera.
He might have launched it and then lost control. But, the fact that it crashed on the White House lawn, leads me to believe that the owner was attempting to buzz the White House and then bring the copter back to the launch area.
former9thward
(32,077 posts)ladjf
(17,320 posts)to navigate to the White House. However, some drones have GPS navigation and autopilots. Conceivably, an autopilot program could guided the copter to the White House and even back to the origin if the batteries held out. But, that scenario isn't very likely.
If the craft was equipped with gps and autopilot, the Feds have not mentioned it.
former9thward
(32,077 posts)I think the guy was just drinking and screwing around and one thing led to another.
ladjf
(17,320 posts)That doesn't seem like a coincidence to me.
former9thward
(32,077 posts)It has a very big "lawn". But yes, he could have been trying to get close. So what? Not the end of the world and no threat to anyone.
ladjf
(17,320 posts)I was just having some fun speculating about how it happened.
However, the versatility of the multiple rotor helicopters is impressive. Controlling their use might be more difficult than most people
might think.
William Seger
(10,779 posts)They have bright LED lights, with different colors front and back so you can see the orientation. If there's at least enough light to make out where the trees and buildings are and you keep line-of-sight, it's not any harder than flying in daylight. If you get confused about the orientation, however, night or day, it's easy to lose control of these things. This guy apparently borrowed the quadcopter from a friend, so that's a good possibility if he didn't have much experience and had been drinking.
riverbendviewgal
(4,253 posts)Now it is known there is a weakness in the security of the White House. THis issue will be addressed and hopefully there will be work on making the White House more secure .
jmowreader
(50,562 posts)Assuming the White House has a radar system to surveil the skies around it, adding a couple of 12-gauge shotguns to blow these creepy things out of the sky would solve the problem in a hurry.
Xithras
(16,191 posts)On radar, they're nearly indistinguishable from the birds that fly over Washington DC. Any radar over DC would have to be tuned to filter out echoes from the thousands of gulls, geese, hawks, and countless other species of birds in the air over the city at any given moment. Small drones like the DJI Phantom would be lost in the noise.
The only way to definitively identify a quadcopter is by eye.
FLPanhandle
(7,107 posts)My drone goes out of control and will crash if all signals are lost.
The Secret Service may have a signal jammer already installed and that's why the drone crashed.
kentauros
(29,414 posts)January 27, 2015
SPRINGFIELD, Va. An employee with the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency was questioned yesterday by the Secret Service as the operator of the drone involved in Mondays incident at the White House.
The employee self-reported the incident Monday. The employee was off duty and is not involved in work related to drones or unmanned aerial vehicles in any capacity at NGA.
Even though the employee was using a personal item while off duty, the agency takes the incident very seriously and remains committed to promoting public trust and transparency.
The Secret Service is currently investigating the incident.
Media Contact:
National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency
Don Kerr
Chief of Media
Phone: (571) 557-2299
Email: Donald.B.Kerr@nga.mil
NGA provides timely, relevant, and accurate geospatial intelligence in support of national security.
https://www.nga.mil/About/History/Pages/default.aspx
Since someone asked upthread about what kind of agency this could be while having "intelligence" in it's name
FrodosPet
(5,169 posts)Codeine
(25,586 posts)Kelvin Mace
(17,469 posts)was running a drone in the dead of night around the White House?
NBachers
(17,136 posts)GreatGazoo
(3,937 posts)underpants
(182,877 posts)Before he sees that he needs to stop
Ykcutnek
(1,305 posts)News Breaker
(14 posts)The wandering drone fell in the WH. Hard to believe.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)"Drunken misadventure" is what it was.
It looks like the WH security stopped it because it could have been weaponized. It's a bit embarrassing all the way around.
ladjf
(17,320 posts)of Washington. Further, the Feds might want to make an example in this case.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)ladjf
(17,320 posts)launch sites that were within 20 miles of the center of Washington, DC.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)the WH? Or were they always forbidden to fly their model planes within 20 miles of the center of Washington? If they were allowed before recent incidents, then that suggests they weren't envisioned as threats, only toys.
ladjf
(17,320 posts)A number of new sweeping proposals about model aircraft are being considered by the FAA. If you are interested, their are numerous articles on the INTERNET about this subject.
What has the government worried is the versatility of the model helicopters. Not only can they operated on all axes, they are easily programmable to operated on automatic, that means they can readily be programmed to fly a pre-determined flight plan with no pilot involved and at a cost of under $600 dollars. The current commercial models are too small to carry much weight, but up-sized models could be easy to produced.
With high quality small TV cameras they are very capable reconnaissance craft. They are , in fact, already being widely used for that purpose.
CTyankee
(63,912 posts)Kennah
(14,315 posts)Turbineguy
(37,365 posts)GW Bush's policies?
JustABozoOnThisBus
(23,364 posts)... but I don't think intelligence-worker-drone-boy had a Cheney making his decisions.