Armed drones designed to neutralize school shooters are being tested in several Florida districts

Three districts in Florida will be testing out a series of new drones armed with pepper spray pellets that are specifically designed to thwart school shootings.

Campus Guardian Angel, a Texas-based company that engineered the drone tech system, said that the exact districts will be selected by Florida’s Department of Education.

Miami-Dade County Public Schools, the largest district in the state, has already shown interest in participating and held test runs at a campus in July, CBS News reported.

The drones, kept in secure charging boxes on participating campuses, will be operated by FAA-certified pilots located in Texas.

But each drone can be activated by school officials on-site through a silent alarm or “other mechanisms,” according to Campus Guardian Angel.

Each drone is equipped with a two-way communication system, alarms, and non-lethal pepper spray pellets, the company said. The drones can also shatter windows with a “glass punch to create distractions,” the company said.

The drones aren’t just let loose upon activation, either. The “company commander” is charged with issuing a flight plan and working alongside school officials and law enforcement before engaging, according to the company.

“In a school shooting, most of the death happens in the first 120 seconds, so it’s really about how quickly can you get there to engage the shooter,” Justin Marston, the founder and CEO of Campus Guardian Angel, told CBS News.

All the while, the drone will also feed video footage to authorities to help them coordinate ways of entry and, ultimately, track down anyone threatening the school.

The actual fleet, which comes in a box of six drones, would cost around $1,000 a month for every 500 students on top of the $15,000 purchase fee, the company estimated. It noted that some schools may need anywhere between three and 15 boxes, depending on the school’s population.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis already set aside a whopping $557,000 in the 2025-2026 state budget to cover the drone demonstrations. It’s unclear how much extra it may cost to actually purchase and install the drones in the three districts.

Since 2018, the same year as the Parkland high school shooting, more than 60 other school shootings have been reported across Florida, according to the K-12 School Shooting Database.

Most recently, two people were shot and killed by a local deputy’s son at Florida State University in April, right as school was winding down for the year. Some students on campus that day had previously survived or lost friends during the Parkland shooting.

AcadeMir Preparatory High School, where the drones were first tested in July, has roughly 1,100 students enrolled. John A. Ferguson Senior High School, the largest in Miami-Dade County, has more than 4,000 students.

The drones were previously tested in Texas’ Boerne ISD, Highland Park ISD, Lancaster ISD and Texas Hill Country, KERANews reported.