FAA lifts unprecedented El Paso airspace restrictions after seven hours; 14 flights canceled
elpasomatters.org
Federal officials abruptly closed and then reopened El Paso’s airspace within seven hours, grounding commercial, military and emergency flights while questions remain about the alleged drone activity that prompted the shutdown.

The Federal Aviation Administration has closed airspace over El Paso and parts of southern New Mexico for 10 days under a national defense designation, offering no explanation for the rare move. The FAA order states aircraft violating the restriction could face interception and possible use of deadly force.

  • SillyDude@lemmy.zip
    5·
    23 hours ago

    I’ve noticed a ton of air force helicopters around el Paso up through central NM on flightradar24. Mostly Iroquois, but also Apaches. I was watching one Apache right in that zone in NM. The Iroquois are flying super low, like 100ft agl, and also landing out in random areas(nonmilitary land).

    Idk, that’s just my aircraft autism. Its cool seeing all the whirly birds on flightradar but it should probably be concerning.

    • protist@mander.xyzOPEnglish
      10·
      1 day ago

      It boggles my mind that they would issue a blanket 10-day no fly order when they were just doing a brief drone response. All of this drama could have been avoided

      • cecilkorik@piefed.caEnglish
        10·
        1 day ago

        Because they weren’t “just” doing a brief drone response. These serve the purpose of testing and eroding the defenses of their enemy (the American people). They do things like this to measure how much backlash there is, like a doctor testing reflexes. Then they continue the tests on a regular basis until they become normalized and resistance fades. Eventually they will be able to issue a 10-day no fly order and nobody will bat an eye, because they do it all the time, and then they’ll be able to use it freely for all the ideas discussed above.

        The road to hell might be paved with good intentions, but the subgrade must first be prepared with a huge supply of false intentions and plausible deniability, among other things.