Campus Guardian Angel, a safety response company, is looking to deploy drones to combat school shootings, running test trials in Florida.
Campus Guardian Angel CEO Justin Marston told The Hill the system puts drones in boxes at different points around a school that can be triggered by an emergency silent alarm and moving within 5 seconds.
The drones are then deployed and controlled by specialists in Texas to stop the shooter by deploying nonlethal projectiles and assisting police with video surveillance.
“If law enforcement is already there, we’ll team with them, like giving them close air support, like having a pack of entirely disposable police dogs that are super smart,” Marston said.
“We shouldn’t risk police lives unnecessarily. We shouldn’t put them into incredibly difficult situations where they’re having to make a lethal targeting decision in fractions of a second. Let us do all of that difficult work, because we don’t care if we get shot. We’re a lump of plastic. We’re entirely disposable,” he added.
Pilot programs are happening in three Florida school districts, which set aside money in the state budget to try the program. Marston said the system costs about $4 a month per student.
In 2024, hundreds of school shootings occurred as educators tried to find ways to combat the tragedies. Tactics such as school shooting drills have been criticized for scaring students, and debates about their effectiveness have occurred.
Marston said the company’s system has received bipartisan support, with skeptics typically interested after seeing a demonstration of the technology that can break through windows to stop a shooting.
“I think that generally, especially when people see the demonstration, when people see a live demonstration on site … 95 percent plus of people who see it go through that paradigm shift in that moment, no matter how mentally prepared they were to not like the idea when they came in” they change their minds, Marston said.
“But it comes down to the incredible capabilities of the pilots and what they can do with these drones, how fast they can move, what advantages they bring to law enforcement, how they can reduce the risk of collateral damage,” he added.
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