Defence Ministry Launches Probe into Drone Footage Near US Military Radar in Tobago

The Min­istry of De­fence says an in­ves­ti­ga­tion has been launched to de­ter­mine how drone footage was ob­tained of the re­strict­ed area near the ANR Robin­son In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port, where the Unit­ed States-in­stalled mil­i­tary radar is lo­cat­ed.

In a me­dia re­lease De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge said the de­sire to ob­tain footage of mil­i­tary in­stal­la­tions and equip­ment and to dis­sem­i­nate it to me­dia hous­es is “in­im­i­cal to na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty in­ter­ests” and “ex­pos­es the cit­i­zen­ry to those who would ben­e­fit from the use of such in­for­ma­tion to our detri­ment.”

Sturge said de­spite claims that the drone op­er­at­ed out­side the 5 kilo­me­ter “no fly” zone from the To­ba­go air­port, his min­istry has in­tel­li­gence that says oth­er­wise.

The De­fence Min­is­ter who has been un­reach­able about the pur­pose of the radar and who has cus­tody of the da­ta, de­spite the Prime Min­is­ter de­fer­ring all tech­ni­cal ques­tions to him said, “The Min­istry of De­fence wish­es to high­light the reck­less en­dan­ger­ment cre­at­ed by drone op­er­a­tors from the ob­vi­ous and in­her­ent dan­ger posed to both in­com­ing and out­go­ing com­mer­cial air­craft dur­ing such drone op­er­a­tions with the re­al pos­si­bil­i­ty of col­li­sions which can po­ten­tial­ly lead to loss of life on a mas­sive scale.”

He added, “The Min­istry of De­fence wish­es to as­sure the law-abid­ing pub­lic that in­ves­ti­ga­tions are afoot to de­ter­mine the iden­ti­ty of the claimed “anony­mous source” who con­duct­ed the sub­ject drone sur­veil­lance in vi­o­la­tion of the law, with a view to pre­vent­ing such fur­ther ac­tions, there­by pro­tect­ing the pub­lic in­ter­est from any fur­ther un­der­min­ing of our se­cu­ri­ty and to en­sure the safe­ty of all air­line pas­sen­gers.”

Sturge said his min­istry has al­so not­ed drone ac­tiv­i­ty close to the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port.

The min­is­ter said, “The Min­istry of De­fence al­so wish­es to re­mind those op­er­a­tors who wish to con­tin­ue in de­fi­ance of the law, that the State will take the nec­es­sary ac­tions to pro­tect the pub­lic in­ter­est should it be­come nec­es­sary, in­clud­ing those af­ford­ed un­der the cur­rent State of Emer­gency.”