According to an Associated Press story published yesterday, we here in Humboldt County will soon get to experience the joy of living under remote-controlled aerial electronic surveillance. Who says war brings no peacetime benefits?
BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — The U.S. Forest Service has bought a pair of flying drones to track down marijuana growers operating in remote California woodlands.
Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey, who oversees the Forest Service, told The Associated Press on Thursday that the pilotless, camera-equipped aircraft will allow law enforcement officers to pinpoint marijuana fields and size up potential dangers before agents attempt arrests.
Rey said there are increasing numbers of marijuana growers financed by Mexican drug cartels using California’s forests to stage their operations.
“We’re dealing with organized efforts now — not just a couple of hippies living off the land and making some cash on the side,” Rey said in a telephone interview from Washington, D.C.
Yes, this is going to play really well here on the ground. Especially following yesterday’s mass uprising against the county’s odd new dope-bust tactics.
UPDATE: Much more from the Sacramento Bee.
SIDE NOTE: Did the AP really title its report “Pilotless Drones to Battle Pot Growers”? Believe it or not, that’s probably a sly AP in-joke referencing the following SF Chronicle podcast, which is legendary:
audio player
This article appears in Bankers’ Lunch: Second Course.
The wit of your headline is further revealed in the recorded rant.
Now that’s entertainment!
Hilarious podcast.
They’re ALL pilotless drones! Yep. Pretty much.
Thanks Hank!
Dylan Darling has a piece in the Record-Searchlight too, saying they’re for sure gonna fly the Shasta-T with their new toy.
I dunno. $100K could almost fund one more LEO (law enf. officer), which the Forest Service needs a lot more than a wireless sky-spy.
The big grows are hella bad, for sure, not because of the ethnicity of the perps but because it’s basically outlaw corporations going berserk on our public lands. But the USFS needs cops to cover a million other problems, like a rash of car-dumping on the endless timber roads.
And as the former FS agent says in the Bee story, they can find the grows just fine with regular planes. Hell, they find ’em with Google Earth (try it at home!). It’s cleaning them out and up that’s the problem.
Time to pick up some camo netting.
That would be a fun job… sit at a computer playing a flight simulator all day, swooping in for a closer look while avoiding enemy fire. Camo netting should actually make grows easier to spot.
time to stock up on surface to air missles.