In a bizarre scene in Washington Wednesday afternoon, a Floridian mailman landed a gyrocopter — a small one-man aircraft resembling something Inspector Gadget might’ve had in his garage — on the lawn of the Capitol Building, in what’s being reported as phase one of his ambitious plan to deliver “letters” to politicians and “save America” through campaign finance reform.

He was greeted on the grass by police and dogs, and promptly arrested.

According to the Tampa Bay Times (who followed the story with extensive coverage throughout) the man who floated north from the Sunshine State at 45 miles per hour at 300 feet in the air was Doug Hughes, a 61-year-old from Ruskin, Florida.

Aside from changes to how political donations are handled, Ruskin also aimed to protest our national security apparatus and, in a broader sense, corruption in government overall.

A coworker and friend — Mike Shanahan (no, not the football coach) — had this to say about the floating postal worker, via the Tampa Bay Times:

Just hours before Hughes landed in Washington, Hughes’ friend said he called a Secret Service agent to notify him of the possibility of the gyrocopter flight.

 

“He’s not a suicide bomber, he’s a patriot,” said Shanahan, 65, of Apollo Beach. The whole stunt centers around Hughes’ effort to change campaign finance laws, “or the lack thereof,” according to Shanahan.

 

About a year ago, Shanahan said, Hughes told him of the idea to deliver letters to legislators by gyrocopter. Not long after, they were both questioned by a Secret Service official in Florida, he said. Wednesday morning, Shanahan said, Hughes called his friend and said he was in Washington, ready to take off.

 

He passed along the website on which he would livestream his flight, but Shanahan, not adept with computers, could not find it.

 

So, he said, he pulled out the phone number he had saved from the Secret Service agent he spoke to months ago. He dialed. No answer, but he said he left a message. No call back. He still was not certain if the protest was actually going to happen.

 

“I didn’t want to get all of D.C. in an uproar and it turn out he was just practicing or something or he was just pulling my leg,” Shanahan said.

It’s still unclear whether or not his letters were delivered.