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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Drone planes might patrol Canada border


Baucus
 (The Spokesman-Review)
Faith Bremner Gannett

WASHINGTON – Remote-controlled surveillance airplanes, similar to those the military uses in Afghanistan and Iraq, could soon be patrolling the U.S.-Canadian border looking for illegal crossings.

The unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) can hover at an altitude of 50,000 feet for a day or more without refueling, and their cameras and sensors can spot objects as small as a milk carton.

Supporters say the high-tech airplanes would make the border more secure and give border patrol agents one more tool for catching people sneaking across the border. Border officials already use high-altitude manned airplanes, low-flying helicopters, ground-based sensors and cameras and uniformed officers to monitor the border. Critics say the unmanned planes are too expensive and unreliable and could open the door to real-time aerial snooping by government and police agencies.

Montana Sens. Conrad Burns, a Republican, and Max Baucus, a Democrat, recently inserted language into the Senate’s version of the 2007 Homeland Security spending bill that would require U.S. Customs and Border Protection to test a UAV at one of its three Northern Border Air Wing bases. The agency has bases in Plattsburgh, N.Y., and Bellingham, Wash., and is setting up a third in Great Falls, Mont., this summer. Two others are planned for Michigan and North Dakota. The House has yet to sign off on the UAV proposal.

“We like security and if it means giving up some conveniences to have it and to protect other people, we’re all for it,” said Montana rancher Gloria Fey, who lives about a mile from the Canadian border and has grazing lands right up to the line.

St. Albans, Vt., Mayor Marty Manahan said the planes could become controversial in his state because of privacy concerns. He questioned whether the UAVs could be used to spy on law-abiding U.S. citizens.

“The potential is there to do a lot more than they say they’re going to do,” said Manahan, whose town is located 15 miles from the Canadian border. “Is it something that you could be lying out by your pool and they can zoom in on you?”

Border patrol operated a Predator B UAV along the Mexican border from Oct. 1 until April 25, when it crashed. Agency spokesman Juan Munoz-Torres credited the UAV with helping agents catch 2,000 illegal immigrants and seize 700 pounds of marijuana and two vehicles in the seven months it was stationed near Nogales, Ariz. The $14 million aircraft, about the size of a Lear Jet, crashed in the desert after its primary flight console locked up and operators failed to properly align a backup console to restore control, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.

The agency is planning to place a second UAV in the same area in early September, Munoz-Torres said.

But T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council – the union for border patrol agents – said he’d rather have the money spent to hire more agents and buy more helicopters. Blackhawk helicopters, which frequently are used to protect the borders, cost $8.6 million each.

Bonner said helicopters and their pilots do a better job of helping agents on the ground round up large groups of people, who tend to scatter when law-enforcement officials approach.

On average, border patrol agents arrest 3,200 illegal immigrants a day, nearly all on the southern border.

“This (UAV) technology is great in a combat situation where you’d rather not risk the life of a highly-trained pilot,” Bonner said. “People are not shooting pilots out of the sky on the northern border.”