A mana government intelligence agency employee, no lesstook to the top of his G Street building late at night to show off his drone to a female companion. He had been drinking. It crashed. On the White House grounds.
At least that’s the story that’s emerged from the latest details revealed by law enforcement regarding the incident that occurred on Monday.
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According to the Secret Service, in the early hours of Monday morning a two-foot wide recreational quadcopter took off from a neighborhood about 10 blocks east of the White House and flew over the President’s residence before crashing on the southeast side of the complex. The Secret Service locked down the White House shortly after 3 a.m. after an officer on the south grounds spotted the drone flying at a very low altitude.
President Barack Obama and the first lady are both away, traveling in India.
The man who was flying the drone “self-reported” his involvement in the incident and said he was using it for recreational purposes, the Secret Service told CNN.
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“Our system is pretty unique. We don’t allow programmers to access the flight controller,” he told CNN. “It would take a lot of hacking.”
According to Perry they already have software in place that stops drones from flying in restricted airspace near airports. The company will also release an update that prevents drones from crossing national borders, following an incident where a smuggler’s drone flying from Mexico crash-landed just south of the U.S. border in a failed drug delivery on January 23rd.
As investigators look into the incident it is still unclear exactly what path the drone followed. But Perry says that the information is stored within the flight controller and could be accessed if the customer explicitly requests it.
Perry said that as of Wednesday afternoon, no law enforcement agency had been in touch about the case.
“If presented with a subpoena or warrant we would work together with law enforcement in accordance with what information we are legally able to share with them,” he said.
