DRONES ACROSS AMERICA : RISE OF THE 'CYBORGS'?

WE CAN TELL OURSELVES IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN IN AMERICA, THAT OUR GOVERNMENT WOULD NEVER USE DRONES AGAINST "WE, THE PEOPLE", BUT WE'D BE STUPID TO ACTUALLY BELIEVE THAT!

DRONES HAVE ALREADY BEEN USED TO ARREST CITIZENS, AFTER THEY WERE SPIED ON FROM ABOVE! YOU MAY SEE THIS AS A GOOD THING...UNTIL IT HAPPENS TO YOU OR A FAMILY MEMBER, MAYBE.

HOW DRONES ARE BEING USED RIGHT NOW IN AMERICA IS SHOWN NEAR THE END OF THIS BLOG, BUT DO READ THE HISTORY, LEARN SOMETHING NEW!

WE'VE BEEN DEVELOPING DRONES SINCE 1916!
DRONES HAVE BEEN USED TO KILL SINCE VIETNAM!

IS THE MILITARY UNDER OBAMA THE FIRST TO USE DRONES?
NO, NOT BY A LONG SHOT!
BUT WE ARE USING THEM A LOT MORE OFTEN NOW! 

HAVE DRONES BEEN USED TO 'SPY ON AMERICANS' BEFORE 2009?
ABSOLUTELY!
SORRY, LIKE I SAID BEFORE, OBAMA'S TEAM HAS YET TO COME UP WITH ANYTHING NEW, WITH ANYTHING THAT OTHER PRESIDENTS HAVEN'T USED LONG BEFORE HE OCCUPIED THE OVAL OFFICE!

HERE'S THE ARTICLE THAT 'SET ME OFF' TODAY...READ CAREFULLY!

March 6, 2013
http://www.cnn.com/2013/03/05/politics/obama-drones-cia/index.html
<<Attorney General Eric Holder is not entirely ruling out a scenario under which a drone strike would be ordered against Americans on U.S. soil, but says it has never been done previously and he could only see it being considered in an extraordinary circumstance.

In a letter to Rand Paul dated on Monday, Holder said it was possible, "I suppose," to imagine an "extraordinary circumstance in which it would be necessary and appropriate" under U.S. law for the president to authorize the military to "use lethal force" within the United States.

[READ THE ACTUAL LETTER HERE: http://www.paul.senate.gov/files/documents/BrennanHolderResponse.pdf ]

However, Holder said the question was "entirely hypothetical" and "unlikely to occur."
The Obama administration has said targeting Americans overseas with drones is only permitted when the U.S. government determines a suspect to be an imminent threat to the United States and when capture would not be feasible. Additionally, all applicable laws must apply.>>

LIKE HELL THEY DO! 
NO LAW APPLIES!
REAL-TIME "RAW" VIDEOS ALL OVER THE INTERNET SHOWS THAT REALLY WELL, YES?
NO, NO LAW APPLIES!

2001, IT BEGINS IN EARNEST!
Armed Predators were first used in late 2001 from bases in Pakistan and Uzbekistan, mostly aimed at assassinating high profile individuals (you know, those "terrorist leaders" etc.) inside Afghanistan.
Since then, there have been many reported cases of such attacks taking place in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia.

In 2005 ALONE, tactical- and theater-level unmanned aircraft had flown over 100,000 flight hours in support of 'Operation Enduring Freedom' and 'Operation Iraqi Freedom', in which they are organized under 'Task Force Liberty' in Afghanistan and 'Task Force ODIN' in Iraq. (WHERE DO THEY GET THOSE HOKIE NAMES?)

A Predator based in a "neighboring Arab country" (GUESS WHO?)  was used to kill suspected al-Qaeda terrorists in Yemen on November 3, 2002. This marked the first use of an armed Predator as an attack aircraft outside of a 'theater of war' such as Afghanistan.

[ WHY CAN'T WE JUST CALL THESE INVASIONS? THEY ARE INVASIONS, NOT WARS!
ONLY CONGRESS CAN OKAY A WAR!
THESE ARE MILITARY INVASIONS, PURE AND SIMPLE! FAKE WARS!
REAL WARS ARE DECLARED BY CONGRESS, AND ARE CONSTITUTIONAL!
WHEN HITLER WENT INTO POLAND, EVERYBODY CALLED THAT AN INVASION...SAME THING HERE!]

WELL, SO IT BEGAN FOR THE MIDDLE EAST... OUR NEW "VIETNAM".

A BRIEF HISTORY OF AMERICAN DRONES, 1916-2013
The earliest attempt at a powered unmanned aerial vehicle was A. M. Low's "Aerial Target" of 1916 [SEE: Taylor, A. J. P. Jane's Book of Remotely Piloted Vehicles] But the amazing genius Nikola Tesla had written about entire fleets of unmanned COMBAT vehicles back in 1915.
[ SEE: Dempsey, Martin E. Eyes of the Army – U.S. Army Roadmap for Unmanned Aircraft Systems 2010–2035 Size: 9MB United States Army, 9 April 2010]. 

A number of remote-controlled airplane advances followed, including the Hewitt-Sperry Automatic Airplane, during and after World War I, including the first scale RPV (Remote Piloted Vehicle), developed by the film star and model airplane enthusiast Reginald Denny in 1935.

More were made in the technology rush during World War II; these were used both to train antiaircraft gunners and to fly attack missions.

Nazi Germany also produced and used various UAV aircraft during the course of WWII. Jet engines were applied after World War II, in such types as the Teledyne Ryan Firebee I of 1951, while companies like Beechcraft also got in the game with their Model 1001 for the United States Navy in 1955.

The birth of MODERN U.S. UAVs (called RPVs at the time) began in 1959 when United States Air Force (USAF) officers, concerned about losing pilots over hostile territory, began planning for the use of unmanned flights.

Within days of the American U2 spy plane being shot down over Russia in 1960, a highly classified UAV program was launched under the code name of "Red Wagon".

The August 2 and August 4, 1964, clash in the Tonkin Gulf between naval units of the U.S. and North Vietnamese Navy initiated America's highly classified UAVs into their FIRST COMBAT MISSIONS of the Vietnam War.

On February 26, 1973, during testimony before the United States House Committee on Appropriations, the U.S. military officially confirmed that they had been utilizing UAVs in Southeast Asia (Vietnam), admitted the USAF 100th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing had flown approximately 3,435 UAV missions during the war.

In the words of USAF General George S. Brown, Commander, Air Force Systems Command in 1972, "The only reason we need (UAVs) is that we don't want to needlessly expend the man in the cockpit."

With the maturing and miniaturization of applicable technologies in the 1980s and 1990s, interest in UAVs grew within the higher echelons of the U.S. military.

In the 1990s, the U.S. Department of Defense gave a contract to U.S. corporation AAI Corporation of Maryland along with Israeli company Mazlat.
The U.S. Navy bought the AAI Pioneer UAV that was jointly developed by American AAI Corporation and Israeli Mazlat, and this type of drone WAS used in the 1991 Gulf War. AND ARE  STILL IN USE TODAY!

As of 2008, the Air Force employed 5,331 drones, which is twice the number of manned planes (Singer, 2009b).
Out of these, the Predators were the most 'commendable' among the military. Unlike other UAVs, the Predator was armed with Hellfire missiles so that it can terminate the target that it locates (Carafano & Gudgel, 2007).
Their overall success is apparent because from June 2005 to June 2006 alone, Predators carried out 2,073 missions, and participated in 242 separate raids (Singer, 2009a).

ANOTHER UAV, the Global Hawk operates virtually autonomously (Singer, 2009b). The user merely hits the button for ‘take off’ and for ‘land’, while the UAV gets directions via GPS and reports back with a live feed.

Global Hawks have the capability to fly from San Francisco, and map out the entire state of Maine, before having to return (Singer, 2009b).

In addition, some UAVs have become so small that they can be launched from one’s hand and maneuvered through the street (Singer, 2009a).
These UAVs, known as Ravens, are especially useful in urban areas AND WERE USED IN IRAQ to discover insurgents and potential ambushes (Carafano & Gudgel, 2007).

The U.S. Air Force has recently begun referring at least to larger UAVs as UAS or 'unmanned aircraft systems' (like Predator, Reaper, and Global Hawk) and more recently is calling them 'Remotely Piloted Aircraft' (RPA), to highlight the fact that these systems are always controlled by a human operator at some location.

THIS NEXT STATEMENT SHOULD CHILL ANYONE TO THE BONE!

<<Artificial intelligence (AI) is advancing to the point where the aircraft are easily capable of taking off, landing, and flying themselves. 
Then they simply have to be instructed as to their mission.

The military distinguishes between "man in the loop"[piloted] and "man on the loop" [supervised] systems, with "fully autonomous"[issued orders] growing organically from the second into a third category.

A.I. systems have been capable of making decisions and planning sequences of actions for decades;>> 

YES, FOR DECADES!

In February 2013, it was reported that drones were used by at least 50 countries, several of which made their own - for example Iran, Israel and China.

BUSINESS IS SURE PICKING UP! 
WAR IS MONEY... FOR A FAVORED FEW...
"KA-CHING!"

BUT INNOCENT PEOPLE ARE DYING FROM THE BUSINESS OF DRONE WARFARE! "MISTAKES" HAPPEN EVERY DAY!  

In July 2009, Brookings Institution released a report stating that in the United States-led drone attacks in Pakistan, ten civilians died for every militant killed.

S. Azmat Hassan, a former ambassador of Pakistan, said in July 2009 that American UAV attacks were turning Pakistani opinion against the United States, and that 35 or 40 such attacks only killed 8 or 9 top al-Qaeda operatives.

CIA officials became concerned in 2008 that targets in Pakistan were being tipped off to pending U.S. drone strikes by Pakistani intelligence, when the U.S. requested Pakistani permission prior to launching drone attacks.

The Bush administration therefore decided in August 2008 to abandon the practice of obtaining Pakistani government permission before launching missiles from drones, and in the next six months the CIA carried out at least 38 Predator strikes in northwest Pakistan, compared with 10 in 2006 and 2007 combined.

THINGS IN PAKISTAN ONLY GOT WORSE!

Pakistani authorities released statistics indicating that between January 1, 2009, and December 31, 2009, U.S. Predator and Reaper drone strikes have killed over 700 innocent civilians. 

The website PakistanBodyCount.Org (by Zeeshan-ul-hassan Usmani, a Fulbright Scholar at the Florida Institute of Technology) shows 1065 civilian deaths between June 2004 to January 30, 2010 and tallying 103 drone strikes carried out by the United States.

After more than 30 drone strikes hit civilian homes in Afghanistan in 2012, President Hamid Karzai demanded that such attacks end.

In 2012, the USAF trained more drone pilots than ordinary jet fighter pilots for the first time since drones came into use.

There is a list of Unmanned aerial vehicles developed and operated in various countries around the world, listed with primary mission(s) and year of first flight.
SEE THE LIST HERE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unmanned_aerial_vehicles


BUT WILL THEY BE USED TO ARREST U.S. CITIZENS?
THAT'S ALREADY HAPPENED!

A motion to dismiss charges based on the use of a Predator drone was denied Wednesday (August 2, 2012).

A North Dakota court has preliminarily upheld the first-ever use of an unmanned drone to assist in the arrest of an American citizen.
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2012/08/02/court-upholds-domestic-drone-use-in-arrest-of-american-citizen

But that was just the start! 

Local police say they have used two unarmed Predators based at Grand Forks Air Force Base to fly at least two dozen surveillance flights since June. The FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have used Predators for other domestic investigations, officials said.

MONTANA, FOREST SERVICE USES TWO DRONES TO FIND MARIJUANA
BACK ON APRIL 4, 2008!
Sure, sure, I know, those evil pot-growers OUGHT to be busted, yes?
BUT WHO'S NEXT?
 HOME ORGANIC GARDENERS?
(SEE MY RANT ON THE U.N.'s CODEX ALIMENTARIUS! IT WILL LIKELY HAPPEN!)
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2245&dat=20080404&id=fw9SAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ijQNAAAAIBAJ&pg=6878,3231560

NEW JERSEY GOT A TRIAL RUN OF A BIGGER MODEL
Army Tests Spy Blimp Over NJ, Aug 10, 2012
http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Army-Spy-Blimp-New-Jersey-Hindenburg-Test-165571076.html

Manufacturer Northrop Grumman says the 302-foot long airship is designed to be a high altitude observation platform.
The Long Endurance Multi-Intelligence Vehicle spent more than 90 minutes around Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in Ocean County on Tuesday.  

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE!
July 14, 2012
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/14/who-is-flying-drones-over-america/

The Texas Department of Public Safety, based in Austin, has its own unique drone, called the WASP, to “support critical law enforcement operations in South Texas.” (MAYBE FOR NOW...)

And the United States Department of Agriculture deploys a drone – named the Bat — to pick up “thermal infrared data” on experimental field sites in Georgia and Alabama. SOUNDS PROMISING, EH?

The Obama administration earlier this year approved commercial use of drones, opening up airspace to businesses of all kinds, from those that seek aerial photographs to sell real estate to those that are keen to monitor oil spills. 
The new drones law will also make it easier for law enforcement to obtain licenses to deploy drones of their own – and inevitably raise issues for civil liberties and the limits of surveillance?

WASHINGTON D.C., NATURALLY!
4/30/2012
http://www.wtop.com/41/2846813/Chief-Drones-certainly-coming-to-skies-over-Beltway

The use of drones in the D.C. area became public information last week, after the Federal Aviation Administration released a list of agencies currently or previously permitted to use the unmanned aerial vehicles. It included many federal departments, such as Agriculture, Homeland Security and Energy as well as local organizations such as Virginia Commonwealth University and Virginia Tech.

 The "Fulmar UAV" developed by Aerovision is almost strictly for civilian applications.

Drones are increasingly used for domestic police work in Canada and the United States, and US police forces, including Seattle and Miami, have applied for drone permits by March 2013.

HOW MANY DRONES OVER AMERICA? HOW ABOUT 30,000!
June 16, 2012
http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2012/06/dron-j18.html

Thousands of military drones to be deployed over US mainland
<<Picture thousands of drone aircraft buzzing around the United States – peering from the sky at breaches in border security, wildfires about to become major conflagrations, patches of marijuana grown illegally deep within national forests, or environmental scofflaws polluting the land, air, and water.

By some government estimates, as many as 30,000 drones could be part of intelligence gathering and law enforcement here in the US within the next 10 years.
Operated by agencies down to the local level, this would be in addition to the 110 current and planned drone activity sites run by the military services in 39 states, reported this week by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), a non-government research project.>>

Some people thought they saw a UFO along the Capitol Beltway in Washington around the middle of June, 2012, but it was a disc-shaped X-47B UCAV (Unmanned Combat Air System) being hauled from Edwards Air Force Base in California to Naval Air Station Patuxent River in Maryland for testing.

NO CURRENT DRONE FLIGHTS IN AMERICA? 
THAT'S JUST NOT TRUE!
http://sheriff.mesacounty.us/template.aspx?id=10164

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Program
By the fall of 2010, we had modified our COA agreement with the FAA to allow us to fly our UAV system anywhere in Mesa County, Colorado, during daytime hours.

This greatly extended our testing ability, as well as allowed us to use these systems operationally, and we were able to assist the Colorado State Patrol with fatality crashes (aerial photos), the Grand Junction Fire Department with the White Hall fire (hot spot sensing and aerial photos), suspect apprehension and more.

In January 2012, we tested a fixed wing UAV product--the Falcon UAV.
This product was the result of a partnership with a Colorado company, Falcon UAV, who ultimately only charged us for the materials to make the system.
The Falcon has a much longer flight time (1hr) and we see potential in using it for search and rescue missions, wildland fire monitoring and broad area suspect searches.

To date our program has flown more than 35 missions with a combined 160 flight hours. 
We are beginning to implement UAS into day to day operations. 

It appears, at this time, that this new technology will work with law enforcement similar to a K-9 unit in that we are training current staff to operate these systems and allow them to carry the equipment in the back of their patrol car, not requiring the addition of new staff.  Each pilot then shares the patrol car, UAV included."

Mesa County Sheriff's Unmanned Operations Team/AP
 In February, the Federal Aviation Administration granted approval to Mesa County, Colo., to utilize the Draganflyer X6, a small drone model that comes equipped with wireless cameras and a variety of sensors, for law enforcement purposes.

The Draganflyer X6 has already been used by police officers in Canada to gather evidence and survey crime scenes. Another model, the Qube, developed by military drone supplier AeroVironment Inc., was developed specifically for law enforcement assistance.

THE LIES JUST KEEP COMING!
“Air Force Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) operations, exercise and training missions will not conduct non-consensual surveillance on specifically identified US persons, unless expressly approved by the Secretary of Defense, consistent with US law and regulations,” according to an instruction on oversight of Air Force intelligence.

At the same time, the instruction states, “Collected imagery may incidentally include US persons or private property without consent.”

LIKE I SAID, THERE IS NO LAW FOR DRONE USE!
http://www.csmonitor.com/Photo-Galleries/In-Pictures/Drones-America-s-unmanned-Predators#366799

WHERE ARE THESE 'DRONE BASES' LOCATED?
[map drone bases   http://www.wsws.org/en/media/photos/legacy/2012jun/j18-dron-base-480.png ]

SOME DRONES ARE JUST SO 'CUTE', SO SMALL! (SO DEADLY?)
A pocket-size drone dubbed the Nano Hummingbird for the way it flaps its tiny robotic wings has been developed for the Pentagon as a mini-spy plane capable of manoeuvring on the battlefield and in urban areas.

AeroVironment's Nano Hummingbird - Outdoor Indoor Flight
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96WePgcg37I&feature=youtu.be

And they have swell names, too, some!
 Like the Black Hornet Nano unmanned air vehicle.

A few pics here:
http://www.csmonitor.com/var/ezflow_site/storage/images/media/content/csm-photo-galleries-images/in-pictures-images/2012/02/drones-update/04-add-0209/11701522-3-eng-US/04-add-0209_full_900x600.jpg

The Norwegian manufacturer of the Black Hornet, Prox Dynamics, bills it as the world’s smallest military-grade spy drone, with a weight of 16 grams and a length of 4 inches. Propelled by two helicopter blades, the Black Hornet carries little more than a steerable camera that records still and video imagery.
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/02/black-hornet-nano/

A Swarm of Nano Quadrotors
Jan 31, 2012
Experiments performed with a team of nano quadrotors at the GRASP Lab, University of Pennsylvania. Vehicles developed by KMel Robotics.
http://youtu.be/YQIMGV5vtd4


The ShadowHawk: This drone can hover silently at 700 feet and even communicate with air traffic control.
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/03/23/article-2119225-124C5AE3000005DC-454_634x405.jpg

A 'neat' little drone, that quadcopter – a machine with four rotors – called the 'Qube' made by AeroVironment, a company that already supplies over three-quarters of the U.S military’s drones.

The firm said: ‘Small enough to fit easily in the trunk of a car, the Qube system can be unpacked, assembled and ready for flight in less than five minutes, giving the operator a rapidly deployable eye in the sky at a fraction of the cost of manned aircraft.’
Qube can hover for 40 minutes and is equipped with dual colour and thermal video cameras.
http://kccheckpoint.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/PoliceDrone.jpg

What’s more, the air vehicle can transmit live video directly to the operator to assist with threat assessments.

Vanguard Defense Industries also makes a police drone, which it boasts can hover at 700 feet without being heard.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2119225/Helicopter-drones-deployed-U-S-police-forces-time-wont-long-paparazzi-use-too.html#ixzz2MuI9UNgy

BUT WHERE ELSE ARE THEY KEEPING DRONES?
WE MAY NEVER KNOW!

February 14, 2013
http://12160.info/forum/topics/the-u-s-drone-census-how-many-drones-are-being-deployed-and-where

The Drone Census, a partnership between MuckRock and the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), aims to answer these questions.

Together, MuckRock and EFF are building a comprehensive database of all drones authorized to fly in domestic airspace.
As of January 14, MuckRock has filed public records requests to 275 federal, state and local government agencies across the country.

[The full list is available here, based on their submissions to FOIA, MOST OF WHICH HAVE NOT BEEN REPLIED TO: https://www.muckrock.com/foi/list/user-DroneWatch/]

SOME STATES ARE BUILDING THEIR OWN BREEDS OF DRONES.
http://angel-strike.com/rcmbio/RCM/DroneProject.html

The Traffic Surveillance Drone project has received initial funding from the Georgia Department of Transportation and the Federal Highway Administration's Priority Technology Program. Aspects of this ducted fan drone are currently under development within the Georgia Tech Research Institute’s Advanced Vehicle Development and Integration Laboratory.
Nice pics of the Dragon Stalker drone there, too.

NEED SMALLER?
Palm-Sized Nano-Copter Is the Afghanistan War’s Latest Spy Drone
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/02/black-hornet-nano/

ISN'T THIS ALL A BIT TOO MUCH LIKE A VIDEO GAME, OR A SCI-FI MOVIE?
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/need-to-know/five-things/drones/12659/

Desensitizing war for everyone else?
 “The drone war is documented, downloaded, accessible for everyone,” Singer said in an interview with Der Spiegel last year. “You can see the videos on YouTube. It’s turning war for some into a form of entertainment. The soldiers call that ‘war porn.’ We can see more but experience less.”

Another concern is that the desensitization of war, along with the cost effectiveness of drones, will lead to more war in the future. At the Washington Post, Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite writes:

 <<Drones will not reduce conflict. 
Their very ease of use will tempt nations, our own very much included, to engage in automated conflict.

The problem with automated conflict, however, is that it doesn’t stay automated. People die in drone wars, just like they died from the automation of arrows when the crossbow was invented.
War machinery has a terrible capacity to tempt us to think it’s something else.>>

At the New York Times, Scott Shane describes the conundrum brought about the U.S.’s precedent of drone use:

    <<If China, for instance, sends killer drones into Kazakhstan to hunt minority Uighur Muslims it accuses of plotting terrorism, what will the United States say? 

What if India uses remotely controlled craft to hit terrorism suspects in Kashmir, or Russia sends drones after militants in the Caucasus? American officials who protest will likely find their own example thrown back at them.>>

EXACTLY! 
IT'S ALREADY HAPPENING! 
SO WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF SOME NUT-JOB FROM A NATION THE USA HAS HIT WITH DRONES HITS US, ON OUR OWN SOIL? 
WELL, WE WON'T BE HAPPY CAMPERS, I GUARANTEE YOU!

IT STILL BOTHERS ME THAT WE MAY NEVER KNOW HOW MANY ARE 'OUT THERE', NOR WHERE!

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2012/04/24/where-are-the-63-drone-sites-approved-by-the-faa-in-the-u-s/
The Calgary Herald reports the FOIA request made by the Electronic Frontier Foundation showed more than 50 non-military agencies have asked for approval to launch drones.

The Daily Mail reported the FOIA revealed 63 active drone sites within the U.S — some of which may be surprising:
   
Most of the active drones are deployed from military installations, enforcement agencies and border patrol teams, according to the Federal Aviation Authority.
   
But, astonishingly, 19 universities and colleges are also registered as owners of what are officially known as unmanned aerial vehicles.

    It is thought that many of institutions, which include Cornell, the University of Colorado, Georgia Tech, and Eastern Gateway Community College, are developing drone technology.

    There are also 21 mainstream manufactures, such as General Atomics, who are registered to use drones domestically.
[MAP: http://www.theblaze.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/drone-locations-620x392.jpg]

The Daily Mail explains red flags show active sites and blue show those locations where licenses have expired since 2006.

Of those with permission to fly drones domestically, the FAA has granted 42 public entities Certificates of Authorizations (COAs).

Sixteen of COAs were reported to have expired and four were not approved.

 Private drone manufacturers, which are given Special Airworthiness Certificates (SAC), include 21 active locations and 17 inactive.

Here’s what the EFF says is left unanswered for now:
    For example, the COA list does not include any information on which model of drone or how many drones each entity flies.
In a meeting with the FAA , the agency confirmed that there were about 300 active COAs and that the agency has issued about 700-750 authorizations since the program began in 2006.

As there are only about 60 entities on the COA list, this means that many of the entities, if not all of them, have multiple COAs (for example, an FAA representative [Thursday] said that University of Colorado may have had as many as 100 different COAs over the last six years).
The list also does not explain why certain COA applications were “disapproved” and when other authorizations expired.>>

SEE WHAT I MEAN?
GIVE THE POWER-HUNGRY A LITTLE POWER, AND THEIR CRAVINGS TRIPLE, THEN TRIPLE AGAIN...IT'S UNENDING!

AND IT'S NOT JUST DRONES OVERHEAD WE NEED TO THINK ABOUT.
DARPA HAS SOME REAL DOOZIES ON THE GROUND FOR THE MILITARY/LAW ENFORCEMENT, TOO! (SEE BELOW)

MAYBE YOU DON'T SEE WHAT I MEAN...SO SEE IF YOU CAN HANG IN THERE AND WATCH A 25 MINUTE VIDEO... OR DON'T. I DON'T WANT TO CUT INTO YOUR MOVIE NIGHT, OR MAKE YOU MISS YOUR FAV TV SHOW....I KNOW HOW IMPORTANT THOSE ARE....NOT REALLY.

Attack of the Drones - USA
http://youtu.be/msHJLwYWX30


                                                   Attack of the Drones - USA

                                                     DRONE BASES, AMERICA

COMING SOON TO YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD...HEADS UP, AMERICA!