Lancaster Wants 24-Hour Spy Plane to Patrol City
Start-up cost estimated at $1.5 million
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Smile, you two sunbathers, you may be on camera.
The city of Lancaster may take to the skies in an effort to keep the city safe.
City Mayor R. Rex Parris and aviator Dick Rutan are working on an "eye in the sky" surveillance system. The plan is to have a plane, armed with a camera, patrol the city 24 hours a day. The system would cost an estimated $1.5 million.
"Suppose your wife is at home and she thinks somebody is breaking in the back door," Parris told the Daily News. "We can see it in 30 seconds."
But now let's suppose your wife is at home sunbathing naked in the back yard. Could the eye in the sky see that within 30 seconds?
That's the concern of some residents who still value their privacy.
"I'm astonished by how many people have called me and said, 'I sunbathe naked in the backyard or swim naked in the backyard,"' Parris told the Daily News.
Parris told the newspaper that the details have yet to be finalized, but the system will indeed have safeguards to prevent abuse.
The eye in the sky could take as long as three years to implement, so there's still plenty of time left to sunbathe without worry the government may be watching.
