Cudjoe Key

Cudjoe Key is a census-designated place and unincorporated community in Monroe County, Florida, United States on an island of the same name in the lower Florida Keys. As of the 2000 census, the CDP had a total population of 1,695.It was originally called Littleton Island.The United States Army activated Cudjoe Key Air Force Station in 1959 to track missiles traveling through the Eglin Gulf Test Range. The Air Force took over operations the following year, and it subsequently became a detached installation of Homestead Joint Air Reserve Base. The station flies a white radar aerostat, known locally as "Fat Albert", which is used for drug interdiction missions by the Drug Enforcement Administration. On April 20, 2007 a Cessna 182 crashed after its left wing struck the tether anchoring "Fat Albert". The aerostat is marked on air navigation charts inside a restricted area that contains the warning, "Caution: Unmarked balloon on cable to 14,000."