Entering Israel, Mexican tourist busted with drone parts in luggage
I wonder if one of these airframes were involved in the cross border crash back in 2010
The El Paso Times, which reported that the drone crashed in El Paso’s Lower Valley on Tuesday. “I was told that it crashed in somebody’s back yard, and that no one was injured. I was paged at 6:28 p.m. on Tuesday, so it happened shortly before that. We were told it was not a police matter,” El Paso Police Department spokesman Mike Baranyay told the Times. The Times suggests that the crashed drone was returned to the Mexico government by U.S. authorities at one of the bridges which span the U.S.-Mexico border.
By Moti Bassok
Nothing like this had ever happened at Ben-Gurion International Airport before: A routine customs inspection uncovered an attempt to smuggle two unmanned aerial vehicles into Israel.
The incident began when a Jewish citizen of Mexico tried to go through the “nothing to declare” lane with three suitcases. Something in his behavior aroused the customs inspectors’ suspicions, so they asked him to open the bags.
To their astonishment, they found two dismantled drones inside. The unusual cargo had gone undetected on both legs of the man’s flight to Israel: from Mexico to France, and then from Paris to Tel Aviv via El Al.
The inspectors detained the man for questioning and summoned security agents. They, too, were stunned at the sight of the cargo.
The Mexican visitor, however, didn’t appear to be fazed by the fuss. When asked to explain the drones, he calmly explained that the Mexican authorities had bought them from the Israeli company Aeronautics Defense Systems. But they had broken down, so he was bringing them to the company’s Yavneh factory for repairs.
