The Eyes Above Texas
IN RECENT YEARS, THE TEXAS DEPARTment of Public Safety has spent more than $15 million on two high-altitude surveillance planes. Typically flying at more than 2 miles above the earth, the planes are impossible to spot from the ground, leaving Texans in the dark about whether they’re being watched.
The planes, according to the manufacturer, are capable of tracking people and vehicles from several miles away and transmitting high-definition video overlaid with powerful mapping software in real time to analysts. By analyzing flight logs and tracking data, the Observer, in partnership with The Investigative Fund, found that from January 2015 to July 2017, during Operation Secure Texas, DPS flew these high-tech planes hundreds of times over wide swaths of Central and South Texas. The majority of the flights were concentrated over just two South Texas counties — Starr and Hidalgo — along the border.
One plane is stationed near the border in Edinburg, in the Rio Grande Valley. The other is based more than 200 miles north, in San Antonio, which has experienced the highest number of inland
