Kenton PD pulls 'drone' April Fools' prank

It's a bird! It's a drone! It's ... an April Fools' prank.

The Kenton County Police Department is not using drones -- nor flying printers -- to track down and cite speeding drivers, though a handful of readers were fooled by the prank posted on the department's Facebook page Wednesday afternoon.

"We like to show that we have a lighter side, and we use Facebook as a public relations tool," said Detective Andrew Schierberg. "I think most people understood that it was a joke."

The department claimed it had deployed "SpeedSwarm Ultimate" remote-controlled drones to identify speeding drivers.

The fictional system would then send "a smaller and completely autonomous camera drone" to photograph the traffic law violator, followed by a "flying printer that chases the car down" and "carefully affixes" a speeding ticket to the vehicle windshield.

The SpeedSwarm is actually a Nerf gun, not a law enforcement drone. And today is April 1 -- April Fools' Day, a national holiday for prank-lovers everywhere.

A handful of commenters took the fictional news item seriously, however, prompting the department to issue a clarification that it was all in good fun.