Lawmakers Warn Drones Are the Next Major Aviation Security Threat

Lawmakers are calling for more aviation safety from aerial drones, warning that foreign terrorist threats are evolving at a rapid pace, quicker than the U.S. military can adapt.

As the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks took place this month, Representatives Michael McCaul (R-TX) and Ronny Jackson (R-TX) are moving to implement stronger security measures to address emerging threats.

“The threat was aviation then,” Rep. McCaul said in a House Committee hearing last week. “I believe it's also aviation today…The modern aviation threat 25 years later is the drone.”

Rep. McCaul pushed his Safer Skies Act, which would give state and local law enforcement greater authority to counter drone threats at large events. After the 9/11 attacks, Rep. McCaul said he became a “student” of counterterrorism, and his time as the special events task force on the FIFA World Cup games focused on the threat posed by drones.

“The idea that planes could be turned into suicide missions was something that was not imaginable, and it was a failure of imagination,” he said. “We saw planes hijacked, but not turned into cruise missiles targeted at buildings.”

Now, Rep. McCaul warns underestimating the threat of drones would be the next “failure.” Rep. Ronny Jackson agreed, adding that to combat the threats of this new technology, U.S. military forces will have to learn how to use it as well.

“The same technologies will be called on to conduct reconnaissance, deliver supplies, overwhelm enemy defenses, and protect critical infrastructure,” Rep. Jackson said in an op-ed for The Defense Post. “America’s competitors are integrating drones and autonomous systems into every part of military operations.”

Rep. Jackson said the U.S. needs to accelerate its drone testing and acquisition process to keep pace with adversaries.

“If we want to keep our battlefield advantage, we cannot afford an acquisition and testing system that moves at peacetime speed while adversaries innovate at wartime speed with real-time feedback,” he said.