FBI Has 17 Working Drones And Only Two Pilots

March 26, 2015
The FBI has said it will build out more comprehensive drone capabilities over the next five years, but the report found it "had not fully developed plans to implement that goal."

The FBI may have drones, but according to a new report, it isn't using them very often. The report comes from the Department of Justice's Inspector General, which found that the FBI's drone program is currently limited to just 17 working drones and two pilots. Most importantly, all of the drones operate out of a single location, severely limiting the range and response time of the program. As a result of the FBI’s centralized approach to UAS," the report writes, "the single team of UAS pilots has needed to travel up to thousands of miles to support FBI investigations across the United States."

According to the report, the FBI is the only Department of Justice agency with an active drone program, and has used drones in 13 investigations between September 2006 and August 2014. (The number has climbed slightly since previous reports: in July of 2013, the FBI said it had used drones a total of 10 times since 2006.) The FBI has said it will build out more comprehensive drone capabilities over the next five years, but the report found it "had not fully developed plans to implement that goal."

More details here.