With terrorist groups renewing calls for would-be attackers to target American rail lines, at least one local law enforcement agency in the U.S. is using drones to help guard against such a threat.
The police chief for the Philadelphia-area’s mass-transit system said he has known for some time that more than 140,000 miles of rail lines crisscrossing America are “porous” and had thought for a while of using drones to monitor the agency’s tracks.
He initiated the drone program after an article in the latest issue of al Qaeda’s English-language publication gave step-by-step instructions for fashioning a “homemade derail tool” and claimed that railroads are among America’s “easiest targets.”
“It is time that we instill fear and make them impose strict security measures to trains as they did with their air transportation,” the publication said.
The al Qaeda article prompted the federal Transportation Security Administration to send a security notice to law enforcement across the nation, ABC News has learned.
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