FCC Chairman Brendan Carr climbs 2,000-foot tower, and it looks like a drone captured the whole thing

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr scaled the WCTI broadcast tower in Jones County, North Carolina, on Thursday, riding a hydraulic hoist most of the way up before climbing the final 101 feet by hand. Carr posted video and photos on X showing his ascent with tower crew members, as part of a Fox Business exclusive with reporter Darren Botelho. The footage is striking. But for anyone in the drone community, one detail stands out: the aerial video orbiting Carr at the top of the tower appears to be drone footage.

That raises an obvious question. What drone was flying at 2,000 feet next to a broadcast tower to film the head of the FCC?

Carr reached the top of one of America’s tallest structures

The WCTI tower rises nearly 2,000 feet above eastern North Carolina farmland, more than 220 feet taller than One World Trade Center. Built in the 1980s and upgraded with a new antenna system in 2020, the structure’s signal reaches an estimated 855,000 households across dozens of counties from the coast to the Raleigh area.

Carr began his ascent around 9 a.m. A hydraulic hoist called a “pan” carried him and the crew partway up. The last 101 feet required climbing by hand. Crews from Broadcast Construction Solutions are currently on-site replacing the tower’s guy wires, a project that reflects the growing demand for skilled tower workers.

This was not Carr’s first climb. He told Fox Business he has scaled “20 or 30” towers across the country, including previous ascents in Alabama, South Dakota, and a 2,000-foot tower near Rowena. The VIKOR logo visible on his hard hat ties back to the Sioux Falls telecom infrastructure company that hosted Carr’s Build America Agenda launch on July 2, 2025.

The aerial footage looks like it came from a drone

Carr’s X posts include video showing smooth orbital shots around the top of the tower, with the North Carolina terrain visible far below. The camera angle, movement pattern, and altitude are consistent with drone cinematography. The footage orbits the climbers, pulling back to reveal the full scale of the structure against flat farmland and forest.

No source has confirmed what aircraft captured the footage. Fox Business has not disclosed the equipment used. Carr’s posts do not mention a drone. We will update this article if we can identify the platform.

The irony is hard to miss. Carr signed the order on December 22, 2025, that added all foreign-made drones to the FCC’s Covered List, blocking new DJI products from the U.S. market. If a DJI drone captured this footage, the man who banned them got some of his best PR from one.

Build America Agenda meets the drone question

The tower climb is part of Carr’s Build America Agenda, the policy framework he unveiled in Sioux Falls in July 2025 covering broadband deployment, spectrum auctions, and telecom workforce development.

“Most people, when they turn on their phone or their TV, they think it works on magic or pixie dust. It’s the hard work of these crews,” Carr said during the broadcast. He added that tower climbers can earn over $100,000 a year.

The workforce message is genuine. But the timing lands days after the FCC released Public Notice DA 26-314, its most consequential drone proceeding since December, asking the industry to weigh in on spectrum access, licensing reform, and Counter-UAS barriers before the January 2027 exemption deadline.

DroneXL’s Take

I’ll give Carr credit for the climb. Strapping into a hydraulic hoist and then free-climbing the last 101 feet of a broadcast tower is not a photo op most regulators would sign up for. But I cannot stop staring at that aerial footage. The smooth orbital shots, the altitude, the production quality. That looks like drone footage. And if it is, someone had to fly a drone at nearly 2,000 feet AGL next to an active broadcast tower to capture it. That operation would require FAA waivers, coordination with the tower owner, and an FCC-authorized aircraft.

When I wrote about Carr’s CES 2026 appearance in January, I noted that the man who banned DJI was taking a victory lap at the very show where DJI built its American brand. This tower climb is a similar dynamic. Carr’s best visual content, the kind that earns 236,000 views on X, was almost certainly captured by a drone. And the odds that it was an American-made drone are, well, let’s just say I’d love to see the flight logs.

DJI controls roughly 70 to 90 percent of the U.S. commercial drone market. The four foreign drones the FCC exempted in March were all non-Chinese. DJI’s Ninth Circuit challenge is still pending. The October 2025 vote that gave the FCC retroactive enforcement power set this entire chain in motion. Watch for the May 1 comment deadline on DA 26-314 to become the next pressure point, especially if domestic manufacturers cannot fill the gap before the January 2027 exemption cliff.

We’re going to try to find out what drone filmed Brendan Carr’s tower climb. Stay tuned.

DroneXL uses automated tools to support research and source retrieval. All reporting and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo.