{"id":2694,"date":"2026-04-30T07:58:34","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T05:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/?p=2694"},"modified":"2026-04-13T10:55:49","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T08:55:49","slug":"us-military-uses-laser-to-take-down-cbp-drone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/?p=2694","title":{"rendered":"US military uses laser to take down CBP drone"},"content":{"rendered":"

The U.S. military on Thursday used a\u00a0laser to shoot down a \u201cseemingly threatening\u201d drone<\/a>\u00a0flying near the U.S.-Mexico border. It was subsequently revealed that the drone belonged to Customs and Border Protection, lawmakers said.<\/p>\n

The case of mistaken identity prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to close additional airspace around Fort Hancock, about 50 miles southeast of El Paso. The\u00a0military\u00a0is required to formally notify the FAA when it takes any\u00a0counter-drone\u00a0action inside U.S. airspace.<\/p>\n

It was the second time in two weeks that a laser was fired in the area. The last time it was CBP that used the\u00a0weapon\u00a0and nothing was hit. That incident occurred near Fort Bliss and prompted the FAA to shut down air traffic at El Paso airport and the surrounding area. This time, the closure was smaller and commercial flights were not affected.<\/p>\n

Washington U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen and two other top Democrats on the House Transportation and Infrastructure and Homeland Security committees said they were stunned when they were officially notified.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur heads are exploding over the news,\u201d the lawmakers said in a joint statement. They criticized the Trump administration for \u201csidestepping\u201d a bipartisan bill to train\u00a0drone operators<\/a>\u00a0and improve communication among the Pentagon, FAA and Department of Homeland Security, which includes CBP.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

\u201cNow, we\u2019re seeing the result of its incompetence,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n

Government defends use of anti-drone laser<\/b><\/h4>\n

The FAA, CBP and the Pentagon issued a joint statement late Thursday that acknowledged the military \u201cemployed counter-unmanned aircraft system authorities to mitigate a seemingly threatening unmanned aerial system operating within military airspace.\u201d<\/p>\n

The statement said it happened far from populated areas and commercial flights as part of the administration\u2019s efforts to strengthen protections at the border.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt President Trump\u2019s direction, the Department of War, FAA, and Customs and Border Patrol are working together in an unprecedented fashion to mitigate drone threats by Mexican cartels and foreign terrorist organizations at the U.S.-Mexico Border,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n

Second time this month laser systems shut down Texas airspace<\/b><\/h4>\n

The El Paso shutdown two weeks ago lasted only a few hours, but it raised alarm and led to a number of flight cancellations in the city of nearly 700,000 people.<\/p>\n

In that case, an anti-drone laser was deployed by CBP without coordinating with the FAA, which then decided to close the El Paso airspace to ensure commercial air safety, according to sources familiar with what happened who were not authorized to discuss it.<\/p>\n

Afterward, members of Congress said it appeared to be another example of different agencies failing to coordinate with each other.<\/p>\n

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said he was planning to brief members of Congress about the incident. He said at an unrelated news conference last Friday that it wasn\u2019t a mistake for the FAA to close the airspace in El Paso and that he doesn\u2019t think it was a communication issue that led to the problems.<\/p>\n

Lawmaker demands an investigation<\/b><\/h4>\n

Illinois Democratic U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth, the ranking member on the Senate\u2019s Aviation Subcommittee, called for an independent investigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Trump administration\u2019s incompetence continues to cause chaos in our skies,\u201d Duckworth said.<\/p>\n

The investigation into last year\u2019s midair collision near Washington, D.C., between an airliner and Army helicopter that killed 67 people highlighted how the FAA and Pentagon were not always working well together.<\/p>\n

The National Transportation Safety Board said the FAA and the Army did not share safety data with each other about the alarming number of close calls around Reagan National Airport and failed to address the risks.<\/p>\n

Drones already causing problems along the border<\/b><\/h4>\n

Cartels routinely use drones to deliver drugs across the Mexican border and surveil Border Patrol officers. Officials told Congress last summer that more than 27,000 drones were detected within 1,600 feet of the southern border in the last six months of 2024.<\/p>\n

The threat to planes from drones continues to increase, along with the number of near misses around airports. Homeland Security estimates there are more than 1.7 million registered drones flying in the United States.<\/p>\n

Anti-drone systems can use radio signals to jam drones, or high-powered microwaves or laser beams like the ones that have been used in Texas, which are capable of disabling the machines. Some others station small drones to take flight quickly and ram into threatening drones. Some systems deploy ammunition, but those are more common on battlefields than in domestic use.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The U.S. military on Thursday used a\u00a0laser to shoot down a \u201cseemingly threatening\u201d drone\u00a0flying near the U.S.-Mexico border. It was subsequently revealed that the drone belonged to Customs and Border […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2959,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[498,98],"class_list":["post-2694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-military-tech","tag-cbp-drone","tag-laser-weapons"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/LASER-WEAPONS-DRONES.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2694"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2960,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2694\/revisions\/2960"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2959"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedefencenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}