Postal Worker Lands Helicopter on U.S. Capitol Grounds to Make Special Mail Delivery

This story has been updated. 

A U.S. Postal Service worker from Florida flew a small helicopter through restricted airspace and onto the grounds of the U.S. Capitol Building on Wednesday, where he was promptly arrested.

Doug Hughes, the gyrocopter’s pilot, flew his mission with the same goal he had each day during his normal job as a letter carrier: deliver the mail. This mail had a special message he drafted for members of Congress, letting them know the federal government was corrupt and he wasn’t going to take it anymore.

Hughes spelled out the whole plan before he executed it to the Tampa Bay Times, which published his story only after he had already taken flight. The Florida mailman said prior to his attempted delivery the act was in protest of corruption and money in politics.

The Secret Service was already aware of Hughes’ plans, according to the Times. Last spring, an agent visited him at his Florida home and interrogated him about his intentions, to which the Secret Service had been tipped off. The agent talked to Hughes for 45 minutes, and that was the last he heard from the agency.

While USPS could probably do without the bad publicity from the Wednesday incident -- Hughes’ gyrocopter had a Postal Service logo on its side, according to photos taken by those who captured the landing -- it did benefit financially from the stunt: Hughes purchased $250 worth of stamps for the 535 letters he wrote to each member of Congress.

In the letter, he said the federal government was acting unethically.

“The popular perception outside the D.C. beltway is that the federal government is corrupt and the U.S. Congress is the major problem,” he wrote, according to the contents published in the Times. He later emphasized the blame for the corruption was rooted in the legislative branch, not the executive: “Obviously, it is Congress who writes the laws that make corruption legal.”

Hughes was arrested by Capitol Police immediately upon touching down on Capitol grounds.  

A spokesman for the Postal Service confirmed Hughes was a rural letter carrier, and said the agency's inspector is working with postal management on the matter.