{"id":161295,"date":"2026-02-12T08:14:23","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T08:14:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/161295\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T08:14:23","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T08:14:23","slug":"faa-suddenly-closes-then-reopens-el-paso-airspace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/161295\/","title":{"rendered":"FAA Suddenly Closes, Then Reopens El Paso Airspace"},"content":{"rendered":"

Initially, the closures came with no explanation, prompting rampant online speculation with people theorizing whether the restrictions were due to military actions involving Mexican cartels or even nuclear testing. But soon conflicting reports emerged. The Associated Press<\/a> and NBC News<\/a> reported that the closures were due to Mexican cartel drones entering U.S. airspace with the military acting to disable the devices, citing a Trump administration official.<\/p>\n

However, a source told the\u00a0Texas Tribune<\/a>\u00a0that the FAA closure was the result of an ongoing conflict between the agency and the Department of Defense, which is utilizing unmanned drones \u201cagainst drug cartel operations.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has to do with the FAA\u2019s inability to predict where [unmanned aircraft systems] might be flying,\u201d an official told the Tribune. \u201cThey have been operating outside the normal flight paths.\u201d<\/p>\n

Politico<\/a>, also citing an industry source, reported that the DoD\u2019s activities included testing counter-drone systems with \u201chigh-energy laser technologies,\u201d noting that lasers can pose a safety hazard to pilots. Per the outlet, the DoD advised the FAA of its intent to test the systems, but the agency ultimately restricted the airspace due to a lack of detail.<\/p>\n

CNN<\/a> reports that officials from the Pentagon and the FAA were set to meet on February 20 over the military\u2019s plans to utilize the laser systems and civilian flight safety concerns. But the Pentagon moved ahead with its intentions to deploy the technology, prompting the FAA to institute the temporary flight restrictions until it was consulted. Per the outlet, the agency did not notify the White House before issuing the notice and the restrictions would\u2019ve been lifted on February 21, the day after the government officials\u2019 originally scheduled meeting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Initially, the closures came with no explanation, prompting rampant online speculation with people theorizing whether the restrictions were…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161296,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[6207,138,140,139,504,27,66129],"class_list":{"0":"post-161295","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-el-paso","8":"tag-aviation","9":"tag-el-paso","10":"tag-el-paso-headlines","11":"tag-el-paso-news","12":"tag-federal-aviation-administration","13":"tag-texas","14":"tag-the-faa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}