4 ms·
There is a circular restriction around the airport and a trapezoid one next to the city (https://elpasomatters.org/2026/02/11/unexplained-faa-order-shuts-down-e
by fabian2k 8mo ago
There is a circular restriction around the airport and a trapezoid one next to the city (https://elpasomatters.org/2026/02/11/unexplained-faa-order-shuts-down-el-paso-southern-new-mexico-airspace-for-10-days/ https://elpasomatters.org/2026/02/11/unexplained-faa-order-s...).
What are the plausible explanations here? I can't think of anything except military action against Mexico (or the cartels inside Mexico). But even that doesn't fit well.
A suspected terror attack could explain the airspace around the airport, but not the weird trapezoid restriction next to the city.
The duration of 10 days is also weird, that seems very long for any kind of emergency situation. And as far as I understand, it is unusual to have no exceptions at all here e.g. for medical transports via helicopter.
- superb_dev 8mo agoAnother interesting note, the trapezoidal TFR is still in place
- belter 8mo ago[flagged]
- vincnetas 8mo agoits hex ascii for : "The Epstein Files"
- galangalalgol 8mo agoNot a bad theory actually. None of the stuff they have done to distract from the files has been without other purpose, but that is how it is done. You have a backlog of things you want to do ranked by unpopularity, and you try to only do one of them when you are being grilled over a worse one already. I'm sure it is down to a science and probably has a name.
- jmclnx 8mo agoNice, I would have fed it through rot13 first, giving: 4775722052636667727661205376797266
- mothballed 8mo agoMost plausible comment I found on the internet was the government lost something in that trapezoid and doesn't want anyone to fly over it and find it until it's collected.
- RupertSalt 8mo agoAh, so an alien's contact lens
- bluGill 8mo agoRoswel is a few hours away by car. Interesting theory but they would lose it there.
- deleted 8mo ago[deleted]
- thebruce87m 8mo agoBroken Arrow?
- morkalork 8mo agoQuick, someone call Skinner and get Mulder and Scully on the case!
- viraptor 8mo agoThe not-totally-crazy ideas from Reddit include: - it's related to the annouced GPS disruption test (although that's a really long time and doesn't seem urgent enough) - someone in Mexico is getting kidnapped by Gov - nuclear tests I wish those were crazy ideas, but here we are...
- RupertSalt 8mo ago> GPS disruption Ah, a very plausible explanation! https://avbrief.com/overnight-gps-testing-affects-huge-area-of-texas/ https://avbrief.com/overnight-gps-testing-affects-huge-area-... The map indicates it will be centered on Lampasas and the region of effect seems to be east of El Paso. So, if the GPS exercises are the cause, the TFRs would've been more likely to bring in Austin, Dallas, and San Antonio. Isn't it possible that a 10-day TFR could be lifted early once the concern is past? They've probably made it 10 days just to establish an upper bound.
- Johnny555 8mo agoIf it's just routine testing, then why couldn't they have announced it earlier to allow companies to plan and/or fly their planes out of the affected area?
- JumpinJack_Cash 8mo ago> > The map indicates it will be centered on Lampasas and the region of effect seems to be east of El Paso. So, if the GPS exercises are the cause, the TFRs would've been more likely to bring in Austin, Dallas, and San Antonio. Wait so people in South Texas won't be able to use GPS on the ground either? Also if the goal is to disrupt the cartels and the people using GPS to know where they are at in the process of crossing the border illegally why is the Army involved in this at all? The Army has no business in taking part of operations to disrupt cartels and illegal immigration, it's the whole rational behind having 3 letters agency including the evil one that rose to prominence lately
- derektank 8mo ago
- MajimasEyepatch 8mo ago[flagged]
- viraptor 8mo agoWithout cutting off the roads first? That wouldn't make much sense, right?
- renegade-otter 8mo agoWell, air travel spreads things harder and faster.
- DebtDeflation 8mo agoSure, but people will just drive to the next closest airport and fly. Quarantine makes no sense as an explanation without accompanying roadblocks.
- ramesh31 8mo ago>Sure, but people will just drive to the next closest airport and fly Tell me you've never been to west Texas.
- mothballed 8mo agoThe next closest airport is Juarez, it's like 6 miles away, full fledged international airport. It's a few hours walk at worst.
- tootie 8mo agoI honestly assume it's something petty. Like an El Paso air traffic controller was rude to a deportation flight pilot.
- nateburke 8mo agoMy guess is nuclear test. Airport circle to secure the transport of the device to the ground adjacent to the test site. Trapezoid is the test site, wider on the side that is less controllable (border-facing). Disconnected because two separate teams executed in parallel without informed oversight.
- estearum 8mo ago... I don't think they're detonating a nuclear weapon in a National Monument 50 miles from a large US city... There are plenty of better places for them to do this.
- junofan 8mo agoIt’s probably not SOP to land nuclear weapons at the municipal airport either.
- jjk166 8mo agoThere is a military base with its own airfield located within El Paso basically right next to El Paso International Airport.
- nateburke 8mo agoNTS was 60-80 mi away from Las Vegas. yes there might be safer locations for an underground nuclear test, but how many of them offer the same "F U" PR capacity relative to Mexico/Juarez/cartels, etc.
- estearum 8mo agoA nuclear weapon is only "F U" PR to cartels if you believe they're literally braindead, which given that they run massive international businesses, I suspect they're not. Nukes mean nothing to a cartel. What an insane idea.
- donkeybeer 8mo agoWhile we have an excuse explanation from the admin now which nobody knows how true or not it is, its trump of course. Why is it off or weird that he'd want to see a big boom.
- elictronic 8mo agoProbably laser shootdown of drug carrying drones.