{"id":406283,"date":"2026-09-21T15:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T15:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/406283\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T15:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T15:48:12","slug":"florida-fishing-charter-catches-a-us-military-drone-photos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/406283\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida fishing charter catches a US military drone | Photos"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHOTOS: Florida fishing charter makes surprising catch: A US military drone<\/p>\n

\"DefaultPENSACOLA, Fla. \u2014<\/p>\n

Speckled trout, redfish, flounder, mackerel, sharks. These are what you might expect to reel in while fishing off the Florida panhandle on any given day.<\/p>\n

But on Saturday, a group aboard a fishing charter was met with an unexpected encounter: a US military drone believed to be a clone of the notorious Iranian-designed Shahed-136.<\/p>\n

>> Subscribe to the WESH 2 YouTube channel<\/a><\/p>\n

Hot Spots Charters, a fishing charter company out of Pensacola, said on Facebook<\/a> it made the surprising catch, alongside a photo of the drone against its other, more assuming, snags.<\/p>\n

\u201cGreat 6 hour today with this crew! If anyone is looking for their drone please call Hot Spots!\u201d charter captain Daniel Arsenault wrote.<\/p>\n

Another photo showed the drone taking up the entire bow section of the fishing boat.<\/p>\n

The discovery was reportedly made near Eglin Air Force Base, home of the US Air Force\u2019s 96th Test Wing.<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

Hot Spot Charters via CNN Newsource<\/p>\n

\"Image\"Image<\/p>\n

Hot Spot Charters via CNN Newsource<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

The Air Force acknowledged a drone was missing from the Eglin inventory, though it would not specify the type, according to defense news site, The War Zone<\/a>, citing an Eglin AFB spokesperson.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can confirm that we were doing a test and the test article went down,\u201d the spokesperson told TWZ. CNN has asked Eglin AFB for comment.<\/p>\n

Arsenault, seeming unfazed by the catch, told CNN he came across the drone by chance.<\/p>\n

\u201cRiding along offshore and saw it floating,\u201d he told CNN.<\/p>\n

The drone appeared be an FLM 136, a clone of the Iranian-designed Shahed 136, which has played a key role in the Ukraine and Iran wars.<\/p>\n

The Air Force announced late last year it had cloned the Iranian-designed<\/a> model, calling them the Low-cost Unmanned Combat Attack System, or LUCAS, drones.<\/p>\n

Manufactured by Arizona-based Spektreworks, the drones are 9.8 feet (2.9 meters) long, have a wingspan of 8.2 feet, and weigh 70 pounds.<\/p>\n

US Central Command announced in early March that LUCAS drones were being used in the war with Iran<\/a>, \u201cdelivering American-made retribution.\u201d<\/p>\n

The photos shared by Hot Spots Charters showed the drone missing its nose section and propeller in the rear.<\/p>\n

The company later said on Facebook, \u201cThe black suvs came and got their drone, all is good!\u201d<\/p>\n

Some anglers appeared to revel in the catch of the day.<\/p>\n

\u201cFun fight but they\u2019re super bony and taste like avgas,\u201d one Facebook user wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cAren\u2019t those strictly catch and release?\u201d wrote another.<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

Hot Spot Charters via CNN Newsource<\/p>\n

\"ImageMore drone stories from WESH 2<\/p>\n

Video below: Neighbors fighting over drone in Central Florida turns into murder-for-hire plot, docs show<\/p>\n

Video below: NTSB releases final report on 2024 drone crash that injured 7-year-old at Lake Eola<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOTOS: Florida fishing charter makes surprising catch: A US military drone PENSACOLA, Fla. \u2014 Speckled trout, redfish, flounder,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[71849,5498,15674,161325,1292,28,161323,30,29,161327,14060,161239,82633,3323,161322,120145,161324,161326],"class_list":["post-406283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-clone","tag-cnn","tag-drone","tag-eglin-afb-spokesperson","tag-facebook","tag-florida","tag-florida-fishing-charter","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-flounder","tag-foot","tag-hot-spots-charters","tag-iran-war","tag-photo","tag-surprising-catch","tag-us-air-force","tag-us-military-drone","tag-war-zone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}