by Charles Lear
On February 9, 2021, at around 10:30 p.m., a helicopter pilot with U.S. Customs and Border Protection flying over Tucson, Arizona, reported to air traffic control that he had just had a near collision with a drone. A Tucson Police Department helicopter was sent into the area and the two helicopters followed the object and attempted to determine the location of whoever might be operating it. While it was described as a drone and a quad-copter, it was mostly tracked using night vision, and the only visual description was of a blinking green light. If it was indeed a drone, it attained an altitude well above the 400 foot limit set by the FAA, performed extraordinary evasive maneuvers, and had a power source that lasted far longer than a normal drone battery.
The story was first reported on May 20, 2021, by Dan Marries of KOLD News who described the “drone” as having attained an altitude of 14,000 feet, staying aloft for over an hour, and being “heavily modified.” A May 21, 2021, Associated Press article reports that the FBI had begun an investigation and was treating the incident as a case of illegal drone operation. It was thought that the “drone” had launched from an area about five miles south of Tucson.
Brett Tingley, who writes for website, The War Zone, began looking into the case and wrote extensively about it, publishing new details as they came to light. In his May 21, 2021 posting, Tingley notes that it’s not clear where the term “highly modified” came from and informs the reader that “we are pursuing more information.” Tingley adds that, if the location of the launch site is accurate, whatever took off would have done so near Davis-Monthan Air Force Base and Tucson International Airport and operated in a highly controlled airspace.
Tingley includes more details in his June 1, 2021 posting. An anonymous source is cited as speculating that the “drone” seemed to be equipped with an infrared camera due to its ability to maneuver in low light and that it was unlikely that it was battery powered due to its altitude, distance flown, and duration of flight. The source also stated that the “drone” was first spotted near some fuel tanks located near runway 12 at Davis Monthan AFB, which is definitely a restricted airspace. Included in the post is a radar track of the Tucson Police Department helicopter that helped pursue the object.
In Tingley’s June 22, 2021 posting, the subheading announces that The Warzone had acquired a copy of the police report covering the incident written by the helicopter pilot. The pilot stated that the object “was very sophisticated/specialized and able to perform like no other uas (unmanned aerial system).” He also stated that it achieved speeds of over 100 mph as it was pursued to up to 14,000 feet. It seemed to him that whoever was controlling the object had visual contact with both helicopters. Summing up, he wrote, “It was quite clear though that this was not like any other uas that we have experienced.”
A recent post on August 19, 2021, written with Mark Cecotti, announces that an audio recording had been obtained of the interactions between the CBP and TPD crew and local air traffic controllers during the incident. On the recording, a Tucson tower employee asks if what they were chasing was a drone, and a TPD crewmember replies, “Yeah was definitely a drone. I just couldn’t tell you – I couldn’t give you its dimensions as it was moving… too sketchy for us to… I assure you it was not a quadcopter, and it was the most advanced drone we’ve dealt with over the last decade here. Its abilities were pretty incredible, um, I just – I can’t tell you exactly its size.” The crew member speculates that whatever they were chasing was satellite driven as “there’s no line-of-sight, there’s no cell phone coverage that could have dealt with that.”
To sum up, the pilots were chasing something beyond any publicly known technology and they were unable to positively identify it. The question that could be asked in this case is this: if a flying object can’t be identified, doesn’t it qualify as an unidentified flying object?