A Delta Airlines airplane sits at El Paso International Airport after the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration lifted its non permanent closure of the airspace over El Paso, asserting all flights will resume as customary and that there modified into as soon as no threat to commercial aviation in El Paso, Texas, U.S., on February 11, 2026.
| Photo Credit rating: Reuters
Mexican drug cartel drones entered American airspace nonetheless had been intercepted by the U.S. militia, officials acknowledged on Wednesday (February 11, 2026), explaining the short nonetheless mysterious closure of El Paso airport in Texas.
But Mexico acknowledged it had “no data” on drones at the border, and the Trump administration’s model of events has been questioned by lawmakers as nicely as sources cited by U.S. media who urged the shutdown modified into as soon as attributable to U.S. militia drone or counter-drone project.
The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) acknowledged on late Tuesday (February 10, 2026) the airspace over the Texas metropolis would be shut to all plane for 10 days, citing unspecified nationwide “security causes”, fully to dangle the closure after much less than 24 hours.
The portray of a drone breach comes some 5 months true into a U.S. militia advertising and marketing and marketing campaign concentrated on alleged drug-smuggling boats and can provide a pretext for President Donald Trump to coach by blueprint of on his threats to procedure larger the strikes to land, doubtlessly in Mexico.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy acknowledged in a put up on X that the FAA and the Defence Department “acted lickety-split to take care of a cartel drone incursion”, alongside side: “The threat has been neutralised, and there is no such thing as a trouble to commercial commute within the problem.”
A U.S. administration first price, within the intervening time, acknowledged the breach modified into as soon as by “Mexican cartel drones”, and that U.S. forces “took action to disable the drones”, with out specifying how they did so.
But prime Democratic lawmakers from the Dwelling Committee on Transportation urged the Pentagon can also had been responsible for the ache, asserting that language in defence policy legislation allowed the U.S. militia to “act recklessly within the public airspace”.
The lawmakers called for a solution that ensures that “the Department of Defence will now not jeopardise security and disrupt the freedom to commute.”
U.S. media reported that the El Paso airport closure can also had been the cease outcomes of U.S. militia drones or anti-drone testing moderately than a cartel threat.
Conflict in opposition to ‘narco-terrorists’
The Pentagon referred questions about the closure to the FAA, which acknowledged when it equipped the crawl that “no pilots can also operate an plane within the areas” coated by the limitations and warned of potentially “deadly force” if plane had been deemed a threat.
It updated its guidance on Wednesday morning (February 11, 2026), asserting on X that the closure modified into as soon as lifted.
El Paso has a inhabitants of about 700,000 and is one in all the 25 most intelligent cities within the USA. Nearly 3.5 million passengers passed by blueprint of the airport between January and November 2025, consistent with data on its online page.
Mr. Trump’s administration insists it is effectively at battle with “narco-terrorists”, carrying out strikes on alleged traffickers within the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, whereas the US president has many cases acknowledged he plans to procedure larger the strikes to land.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum opposes U.S. militia intervention in her nation nonetheless has to this level managed to negotiate a most intelligent diplomatic line with Mr. Trump.
She has stepped up the extradition of cartel leaders to the USA and reinforced border cooperation amid tariff threats from Trump, for whom curbing unlawful migration from Mexico modified into as soon as a key election promise.
Ms. Sheinbaum advised a data conference on Wednesday (February 11, 2026) that she had “no data on the suppose of drones at the border” nonetheless that her authorities modified into as soon as investigating the airport closure.
The US started carrying out strikes on alleged drug-trafficking boats in September, a advertising and marketing and marketing campaign that has killed no longer much less than 130 folks and destroyed dozens of vessels within the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean.
U.S. officials have not any longer provided definitive evidence that the vessels are intelligent by drug trafficking, prompting heated debate about the legality of the operations, which consultants suppose quantity to extrajudicial killings.
Mr. Trump additionally ordered a fine special forces raid in Caracas firstly of January to dangle Venezuelan chief Nicolas Maduro, whom Washington accused of main a drug cartel.
Printed – February 12, 2026 02:34 am IST
