U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has completed the construction of the first seven of 52 Integrated Fixed Towers along Arizona's border with Mexico. This is the first phase of a new surveillance system known as the Arizona Border Surveillance Technology Plan, which was announced in 2011 and is expected to be fully operational by 2020.
Located in Nogales, Ariz., The solar-powered towers are 80 feet tall and equipped with radar and both day and night cameras that transmit real-time information and footage to Border Patrol command posts, reported TeleSUR. This is the latest security initiative in a series of unsuccessful and delayed plans to create a "virtual fence" along the entire U.S.-Mexico border, according to The International Business Times.
This time, the plan incorporates a more comprehensive timeline and cost estimates in the face of lawmakers' resistance to further overspending and mismanagement in the ongoing debates over border security, according to In Homeland Security. The plan's surveillance technology will combine a system of ground-based sensors, long-range night-vision telescopes and binoculars mounted on trucks and outposts, as well as fixed towers outfitted with radar capacity.
The towers will allow border officials to "see in areas we weren't able to see before. It's like turning on a lightswitch," explained Jose Verdugo, Border Patrol operator at the Nogales station. Upon completion, the program will allow border officials to maintain "90 percent situational awareness," Fernando Grijalva, assistant chief of the Tucson Sector's Communications Department, told The Arizona Daily Star.
The primary goal of the surveillance project is to crack down on the amount of undocumented migrants and drug smugglers that traverse the border. The Department of Homeland Security revealed last week that the number of migrants seized at the border fell by 30 percent in 2015, from 486,000 in 2014 to 337,000, .
In October, however, it was reported that the number of unaccompanied minors apprehended at the border was 5,000, which is almost double compared to last year.
