(KRON) — A Brentwood man was arrested at San Francisco Worldwide Airport on Tuesday after he allegedly flew a drone over Vandenberg Area Pressure Base in Santa Barbara County, the US Division of Justice stated.
Yinpiao Zhou, 39, was charged with failure to register an plane, not offering transportation and violation of nationwide protection airspace.
In response to an affidavit, drone detective methods on the Vandenberg base detected a drone flying overhead on Nov. 30. It flew for about one hour, went as much as almost a mile above floor degree and originated from close by Ocean Park.
Luigi Mangione beforehand reported lacking in San Francisco: stories
Safety personnel went to the park and located Zhou and one other particular person. The drone that flew over the bottom was in Zhou’s jacket, the DOJ stated.
After buying a federal search warrant, brokers appeared on the drone and located a number of images of the Area Pressure base. Zhou had beforehand Googled “Vandenberg Space Force Base Drone Rules” and messaged somebody about easy methods to hack the drone to permit it to fly larger, per the DOJ.
Zhou is a Chinese language citizen and a authorized everlasting resident of the US. He was arrested at SFO earlier than boarding a flight again to China.
Zhou had not too long ago returned to the US from China in February. His confederate at Ocean Park got here to the US from China 4 days earlier than the drone incident.
If Zhou is convicted, he faces a most sentence of 4 years in federal jail. The FBI is investigating the scenario.
