“None of the breaches appear to have demonstrated hostile intent. Anything that flies in our restricted airspace can pose a threat,” the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said in a statement to the US newspaper.
The drones flew at a speed exceeding 160 kilometers per hour at a height of around 900 to 1200 meters. Witnesses said the drones sounded like a “parade of lawnmowers”.
However, the American army could not shoot them down. According to the law, it could only do so if the drones represented a direct threat. “Spying” as a reason does not hold up, said the letter, according to which the US Congress is now calling for an increase in the powers of the military.
Elaborate operation
American officials said that it was an elaborate operation, therefore, according to them, it is impossible that amateurs are behind it. The drones flew in a certain pattern: one or two drones with fixed wings and below them smaller quadcopters of the type of roughly twenty-kilogram commercial drones that flew more slowly.
Because of the drones, the American base canceled some of its training missions last December, and even moved the F-22 fighter jets to another air base.
Maybe China is behind it
During a rainy morning, on January 6 this year, 26-year-old Chinese citizen Feng-jun Shi parked his rented Tesla about 17 kilometers from the Langley base. The car was standing in front of a shipyard operated by HII, which builds nuclear submarines and the latest generation of Ford-class aircraft carriers.
Ši, a student at the University of Minnesota, told his neighbors in the morning that he had flown the drone, but it got stuck in a tree. He then tried to free her, but in the meantime his neighbor called the police. The policemen then told the young man to call the fire department.
Instead, he returned the rented car and left the city. The next day he flew from Virginia to California. However, the drone fell from the tree and ended up with the American FBI, which found photos of American ships in it. Some photos were taken at night, i.e. at the time when unidentified drones were flying over the American base last December.
On January 18, the FBI detained the young man while he was waiting for a plane to China. He told the agents that he was a boat enthusiast and that he had no idea he was taking pictures of something he wasn’t supposed to.
Ši was subsequently charged and sentenced to six months in prison for taking photographs of classified objects. The court in Norfolk imposed this sentence on him on October 2. Ši confessed to everything. “I’m sorry for what happened,” he said before hearing the verdict.
Judge Lawrence Leonard said that he did not believe a word he said. “His story has a lot of ambiguity,” said Leonard, according to the newspaper. “If he was a foreign agent, he would be the worst spy in history,” said the lawyer of the convicted Shaoming Cheng.
For the time being, American officials have not found out who was flying drones over Langley and why. “It’s not tomorrow’s problem, but today’s,” said Tom Karako, head of the American think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It’s a problem everywhere,” he added.