A 52-year-old man from Volos had the serious criminal charge of espionage laid against him for videotaping the American warship "USS Arlington" when it arrived at the port of the city to participate in the "Alexander the Great" military exercises.
Last Wednesday, the 52-year-old flew an unmanned aircraft from the Pefkakia area in Volos and then over and around the American warship and helicopter carrier, videotaping and photographing.
However, the drone was noticed by the crew and the Port Authority was immediately informed. They located the pilot and arrested him.
The 52-year-old was taken to the Volos Public Prosecutor on Thursday, who prosecuted him for espionage on a felony charge, was given a deadline by the investigator to prepare his testimony and was released on restrictive terms.
According to his lawyer, the accusation of espionage is not substantiated as he was not found in possession of any other photographic material of military content. At the same time, making drone recordings is his hobby.
USS Arlington (LPD-24), a San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock, is the third ship of the United States Navy to be named for Arlington, Virginia, the location of the Pentagon and the crash site of American Airlines Flight 77 during the terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001.
Like her sister ships, USS New York and Somerset, she is named in commemoration of the attacks. Steel taken from the Pentagon after the attacks is displayed aboard in the ship's museum.
Arlington's keel was laid down on 26 May 2008, at Northrop Grumman's Ingalls shipyard in Pascagoula, Mississippi. Builder's Trials of the ship started on 21 August 2012. These were completed on 30 August 2012.
She completed Navy acceptance sea trials on 2 November 2012. The US Navy formally accepted the ship on 7 December 2012.
Arlington arrived at her homeport of Naval Station Norfolk, Virginia on 22 March 2013 in preparation for commissioning.
Officially, she was commissioned on 8 February 2013, but her ceremonial commissioning occurred on 6 April 2013 at Naval Station Norfolk.
Originally scheduled as the third ship of the San Antonio class, she was the eighth to be commissioned. Mrs. Joyce Rumsfeld, wife of former United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, is the ship's sponsor.
USS Arlington with embarked 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, is participating in exercise Alexander the Great 2022 under the command and control of Task Force 61/2.
ATG22 is a bilateral U.S.-Greece (Hellenic) amphibious training event designed to exercise battalion-level command and control and company-level combined arms training in order to increase U.S. and Greek interoperability and demonstrate the trans-Atlantic relationship between U.S. Navy-Marine Corps and Hellenic Armed Forces.
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