Did a Mexican cartel just try to attack El Paso?

The airspace implicit El Paso, Texas, was closed precocious Tuesday aft Mexican cartel drones breached the airspace, according to reports by the Associated Press and CNN that cited U.S. authorities sources.

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy subsequently said connected societal media that the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the Department of War (DOW) “acted swiftly to code a cartel drone incursion.”

The FAA and DOW acted swiftly to code a cartel drone incursion.

The menace has been neutralized, and determination is nary information to commercialized question successful the region.

The restrictions person been lifted and mean flights are resuming. https://t.co/xQA1cMy7l0

— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) February 11, 2026

“The menace has been neutralized, and determination is nary information to commercialized question successful the region,” helium wrote connected X Wednesday morning.

Earlier connected Wednesday, the FAA announced connected societal media that the “temporary closure” of airspace implicit El Paso had been lifted, conscionable hours aft it said successful a Notice to Airmen that craft could not alert supra El Paso for 10 days, from Feb. 11 to Feb. 21, for “Special Security Reasons.”

The closure would person prevented flights from landing astatine oregon departing from El Paso International Airport until the pursuing Saturday. Airspace supra Santa Teresa, New Mexico, located astir 24 kilometers northwest of El Paso Airport, was besides temporarily closed. Mexican airspace was not affected.

On Wednesday morning, the FAA said determination was “no menace to commercialized aviation,” adding that “all flights volition resume arsenic normal.”

The Associated Press reported connected Wednesday that it was told by a Trump medication authoritative that the airspace implicit El Paso was closed aft Mexican cartel drones breached the airspace, portion CNN cited a U.S. authorities authoritative arsenic saying the aforesaid thing.

“The Department of War took enactment to disable the drones,” the unnamed authoritative told CNN.

“The FAA and DOW person determined determination is nary menace to commercialized travel.”

AP said that the authoritative it spoke to didn’t accidental however galore drones breached the airspace supra El Paso — located other Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua — oregon explicate what specifically was done to disable the unmanned aerial vehicles.

NBC News and ABC News besides reported that they were told by a Trump medication authoritative that Mexican cartel drones had breached U.S. airspace, but the DOW disabled them.

The Texas Tribune acknowledged that the U.S. authorities “says the antithetic closure was triggered by Mexican cartel drones breaching U.S. airspace,” but said that accusation contradicted “an manufacture root who said it was due to the fact that of an impasse with the Department of Defense [as the DOW was antecedently known] implicit the usage of unmanned subject aircraft.”

“An manufacture official, who had been briefed connected the substance by the FAA successful a greeting telephone and asked not to beryllium identified, told the Tribune that the Defense Department has been operating unmanned aircraft, oregon drones, against cause cartel operations from a basal adjacent El Paso’s airdrome without sharing accusation with the FAA,” the Tribune reported.

“It has to bash with the FAA’s inability to foretell wherever [unmanned craft systems] mightiness beryllium flying,” the authoritative told the Tribune. “They person been operating extracurricular the mean formation paths.”

For its part, The New York Times reported that officials “offered conflicting explanations for a impermanent closure of airspace implicit El Paso.”

It noted that Duffy and different U.S. authorities officials attributed the closure to a breach of U.S. airspace by Mexican cartel drones, but added that “two radical briefed by Trump medication officials said the shutdown was prompted by the Defense Department’s usage of caller counter-drone exertion and concerns astir the risks it could airs to different craft successful the area.”

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy attributed the closure to incoming cartel-controlled drones. Other officials gave a different, little alarmist explanation. (@SecDuffy/X)

Mexican cartel drones person antecedently breached U.S. airspace, according to a elder Trump medication official.

Last July, Steven Willoughby, a high-ranking authoritative with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said that “nearly each day, transnational transgression organizations usage drones to convey illicit narcotics and contraband crossed U.S. borders and to behaviour hostile surveillance of instrumentality enforcement.”

He asserted that it was “only a substance of time” earlier Mexican transgression organizations carried retired drone attacks against U.S. citizens and instrumentality enforcement authorities.

In caller months, the Trump medication has ramped up its combat against cause trafficking, launching galore attacks connected alleged cause boats successful the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific Ocean, and capturing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who is accused of starring a drug-trafficking organization.

With reports from AP, CNN and NBC News