{"id":66145,"date":"2025-07-15T00:14:14","date_gmt":"2025-07-15T00:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/66145\/"},"modified":"2025-07-15T00:14:14","modified_gmt":"2025-07-15T00:14:14","slug":"texas-company-touts-drones-for-active-shooter-response-at-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/66145\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas company touts drones for active shooter response at schools"},"content":{"rendered":"

Drones buzzed through the hallways and corridors of Lancaster Middle School on Monday. The three drones, swirling up and down the staircases in the entrance at about 50 miles per hour, weren\u2019t about fun, but safety during active shooter events<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Austin-based company Campus Guardian Angel demonstrated its active shooter emergency response drones Monday at Lancaster.<\/p>\n

With drones already implemented in the Miami-Dade County Public Schools district, as well as in Boerne ISD and Waco ISD, the company hopes to be able to implement this emergency response strategy in schools across the Dallas area. <\/p>\n

Campus Guardian Angel CEO Justin Marston said at the demo on Monday that the point of the drone is to distract, keeping the assailant occupied while law enforcement is on the way. <\/p>\n

The Education Lab<\/p>\n

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Marston said that if the assailant is too busy trying to shoot down the drone, they will spend less time harming people and potentially taking human lives. <\/p>\n

\"ThreeThree Campus Guardian Angel drones fly through Lancaster Middle School during a demonstration, Monday, July 14, 2025, in Lancaster.(El\u00edas Valverde II \/ Staff Photographer)Related:A Dallas high school fortified its campus after a shooting. Then gunfire struck again<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing is, we get shot, we don\u2019t care. We\u2019re just a lump of plastic, so we\u2019re prepared to take any risk that\u2019s necessary,\u201d Marston said. <\/p>\n

Marston said each drone plays a different role in confronting an assailant. One drone may locate and track every move of the assailant, while another will distract and delay their actions. Each drone is controlled by trained drone pilots.<\/p>\n

The drones are armed with less-than-lethal pepper balls, designed to disarm the assailant temporarily until law enforcement arrives. They are also equipped with a \u201cpunch\u201d that can break through glass if needed to reach an assailant.<\/p>\n

Related:Shootings are up 31% in schools. Will our politics meet the moment? <\/a>\"AA Campus Guardian Angel employee watches as a pair of drones fly around during a demonstration at Lancaster Middle School, Monday, July 14, 2025, in Lancaster.(El\u00edas Valverde II \/ Staff Photographer)<\/p>\n

Once law enforcement arrives on the scene, the drones can help them navigate through a school they may not be familiar with, cutting down the time required to locate an assailant and ensuring the safety of responding officers.<\/p>\n

State Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, emphasized the need for new solutions to keep Texas schools safe. <\/p>\n

\"AA Campus Guardian Angel drone crashes into a dummy during a demonstration at Lancaster Middle School, Monday, July 14, 2025, in Lancaster. The drones can fly at speeds of 50-60 mph.(El\u00edas Valverde II \/ Staff Photographer)<\/p>\n

\u201cAs far as I\u2019m concerned, we\u2019ve got to protect the children. We have to be able to disrupt intruders,\u201d West said. \u201cWe saw what happened in Uvalde. School resource officers were hesitant to go into that room, and so what you\u2019ve got to recognize is, there\u2019s a danger for them also, but they are there on the front line.\u201d<\/p>\n

West also emphasized the need for these programs to be accessible and affordable for school districts and the state to fund these solutions. <\/p>\n

According to the Campus Guardian website, implementing the program would cost a school $4 per student per month, with a box of six drones costing an additional $15,000. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve tried to make it affordable. I mean, frankly, private schools have told us they would pay 10 times what we\u2019re asking to get this,\u201d Marston said. \u201cBut, you know, public schools don\u2019t have that kind of funding, and so it was really important to us to try and figure out making all of the components low-cost, enough to be affordable for every school, rather than just a tool for the wealthiest school districts and private schools.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dallas Independent School District police Chief Albert Martinez emphasized the need to open up different avenues for drones. <\/p>\n

Wilmer-Hutchins High School<\/a> in DISD had a school shooting in April, its second in a year. Several students and a teacher<\/a> were injured. Martinez did not address the Wilmer-Hutchins shootings at the demonstration on Monday, but said he\u2019d need to see more for the district to invest in the technology.<\/p>\n

Related:How to talk to your child about school shootings<\/a><\/p>\n

Martinez said he feels that if Campus Guardian Angel can expand drone usage into responding to daily issues beyond active shooter events, DISD would have more of a reason to participate. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhatever our cost is going to be, I\u2019m going to want more,\u201d Martinez said. \u201cHow often is [an active shooter event] going to happen? What more can you give me on a daily basis that safeguards our students, our staff, our teachers, and helps our SLOs, even at football games, volleyball games, whatever the case may be?\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Drones buzzed through the hallways and corridors of Lancaster Middle School on Monday. The three drones, swirling up…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":66146,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,4219,1596,7290,16213,407,13459,158,358,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-66145","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-crime","10":"tag-dallas","11":"tag-dallas-county","12":"tag-dallas-isd","13":"tag-education","14":"tag-lancaster","15":"tag-technology","16":"tag-texas","17":"tag-tx","18":"tag-united-states","19":"tag-united-states-of-america","20":"tag-unitedstates","21":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","22":"tag-us","23":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114854367612509721","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66146"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}