US airspace closures, lack of answers deepen East Coast drone mystery

Analysis Mystery drone fever continues to grip the US East Coast – and appears to be moving inland – as elected officials beg the federal government to do something. Meanwhile the feds reiterate what they've been saying all along: We don't know what's going on, but you all need to calm the hell down. 

Reported sightings of unidentified flying objects said to be the size of sports utility vehicles have been on law enforcement's radar for nearly a month now. Sightings were first reported near the US Army's Picatinny Arsenal in Morris County, New Jersey, then spread throughout the state – including near Naval Weapons Station Earle close to New Jersey's southeastern coast. 

The FBI noted in a press briefing Friday it had issued flight restrictions prohibiting drone flights over the Arsenal and over Trump National Golf Club in nearby Bedminster, following drone sightings there. 

Along with the temporary flight restrictions, drone sightings have prompted officials in New York to close runways at Stewart International Airport near Poughkeepsie. Sightings are affecting airspace as far as western Ohio, where Wright-Patterson Air Force Base closed its airspace Friday night and into Saturday after drones were reported in the area. 

Bob Purtiman, chief of public affairs for Wright-Patterson, told The Register that the drones supposedly spotted near the Ohio facility were "small" – suggesting they might not be part of the same mystery SUV-sized drones allegedly spotted on the East Coast.

The governors of both New Jersey and New York, on the other hand, have urged federal officials to take action. New York governor Kathy Hochul lamented the situation "has gone too far" after the hour-long closure of Stewart Airfield. 

Both Hochul and New Jersey governor Phil Murphy have asked the White House to mobilize additional resources to help their investigators figure out what sort of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) are buzzing around the skies of their states. Hochul revealed on Sunday that her pleading has led to the federal government sending a drone detection system to New York, while she continued to plead for the passage of a stalled bill that would give states more authority to develop their own counter-UAS programs.

What exactly is going on?

If federal officials know what's going on with all these mystery drone sightings, they're not saying. The official line since the government held a joint press briefing with the FBI, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Department of Defense (DoD) officials on Friday continues to be the same: They're not sure what's up there, either.

Not that the government hasn't acknowledged something is happening. No one is denying the existence of unidentified UASes buzzing around America's East Coast – Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told ABC News over the weekend that "there's no question that drones are being sighted."

That said, while something strange is definitely happening, officials have reiterated that there's no indication it's a foreign threat, no sign the drones are flying in from foreign ships anchored offshore, no evidence of "large-scale UAS activities" – and plenty of reason to think most of what the public are spotting and worried about has a perfectly reasonable explanation.

According to the FBI, fewer than 100 of the more than 5,000 tips the agency has received since setting up a UAS hotline last week have been actionable. While investigating the sightings that have been worth following up on, the FBI said a pattern emerged: Most reports have been in the flight approach patterns for Newark-Liberty, JFK, and LaGuardia airports.

That, as far as the FBI is concerned, means a lot of what people are seeing is manned aircraft that they're mistaking for uncrewed drones – which the agency said is a common misconception. 

The DHS has come to much the same conclusion, noting that it has deployed advanced camera and drone-specific radar equipment in New Jersey from its R&D pipeline, and hasn't detected anything unusual in Garden State skies. 

An FBI official on the Friday call observed that they believed people were overreacting to news of unexplained sightings in New Jersey which the FBI is still uncertain about and looking into, but has no evidence to suggest an actual link between the drone fever that's arisen since last month and the original mystery buzzing above president-elect Donald Trump's golf club and Picatinny Arsenal.

In short, calm down.

The FBI, DHS, FAA, and DoD aren't done investigating the matter, however – and they don't know if the activity is criminal or malicious. A DoD official on the call did indicate that unauthorized drone flights over military facilities are a common occurrence and considered irresponsible.

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Whether you believe any of that is another matter altogether. Trump, for one, does not. 

Speaking to reporters from his Mar-a-Lago resort yesterday, the president-elect said he believed the government knows what's going on. 

"Our military knows where they took off from, where it came from and where it went, and for some reason they don't want to comment," Trump opined. "Our military knows and our president [Biden] knows, and for some reason, they want to keep people in suspense.

"I think they'd be better off saying what it is," Trump added, while suggesting he didn't believe it was an enemy of the US – because, if it were, the aircraft would have been shot down. 

Shooting them down – at least with bullets – might not be the best idea, as was shown in 2018 when alleged unauthorized drones were reported at London's Gatwick Airport, causing significant disruption to airport operations. UK officials said shooting a drone down in a populated area, or over an airfield, could harm people and equipment.

Of course, the Gatwick case remains controversial. Quadcopters flown by the plod to look for the mystery machine themselves became a source of drone complaints. Pressure to find a culprit led to the wrongful arrest of a couple who ended up being paid £200,000 after police held them for more than a day.

There's still no hard evidence a drone was actually flown near the airport, and the cops may have done nothing more than chase their own tails at Gatwick.

Given the FBI's statements to date, it's possible we may be in a similar situation right now.

Even if there are mystery drones zipping around New Jersey airspace, the US government is unlikely to just blast them out of the air – it wouldn't even shoot down a high-altitude spy balloon before it reached open waters. These mystery drones are allegedly the size of an automobile – much bigger than a tiny commercially available drone, and likely to do serious damage if they're anything like what spotters have described.

We contacted multiple government agencies and the Biden administration for comment, but didn't hear back from anyone aside from the FBI – except that it had nothing new to share since the Friday briefing. 

Absent answers, conspiracies take flight

Humans in general – and it seems Americans, especially – are loath to let a bit of unexplained phenomenon go without explanation, even if said explanation is beyond reasonable belief. Unexplained drones, naturally, invite many a wild conspiracy. 

Forbes published a roundup of some of the wildest, cataloging internet denizens that suggested the drones were a plot by Biden to prevent Trump from returning to the office, advanced alien (or unknown earthling) technology, or other bizarre ideas – like the staging of a fake alien invasion by a shady cabal of global elites bent on establishing a world government using advanced holographic NASA technology. Yes, really.

Others, like Saxon Aerospace CEO John Ferguson, have suggested the drones could be secretly searching for radiation or gas leaks, possibly to prevent the explosion of a dirty bomb – in which case, authorities might want to keep things quiet as they try to avert a disaster. 

"My own guess is that these drones are not nefarious in intent," Ferguson suggested. 

It's also entirely possible the whole thing can just be chalked up to stupidity, too. Two men were arrested in Boston over the weekend for flying drones too close to Logan International Airport, which can only be described as an idiot move given the current climate of drone panic. 

Time is running out for Congressional action

The various agencies on the Friday call, as well as Hochul and Murphy, have urged Congress to pass the Counter-UAS Authority Security, Safety, and Reauthorization Act that was introduced in June.

The bill would reauthorize the DHS, DoJ, and FAA's counter-UAS authority and give them access to "critical tools to mitigate credible threats posed by drones," according to the House Committees on Homeland Security, Transportation and Infrastructure and Judiciary. The bill would also give authority to the states to manage their own counter-UAS programs. All of the provisions of the original act, last reauthorized in 2018, expired in October.

We contacted the office of Representative Mark Green (R-TN), the bill sponsor and chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, to inquire whether the legislation might be expedited in light of the current panic. In response, we were referred to the Homeland Security Committee. An aide from the Committee informed us that the bill had been marked up and passed out of committee, clearing it for further advancement.

"Chairman Green hopes this bipartisan legislation can continue to advance through Congress to provide law enforcement the support they need," the aide told us, without providing specifics on if or when the bill might be voted on. Time's running out, though – this is the last week Congress is in session for the year before breaking for the holidays, and there are only a few limited days in January before the 118th Congress wraps up to make way for the 119th. 

If it isn't passed before then, the bill will have to be reintroduced, and the process starts all over again. That definitely wouldn't please the states or federal agencies clamoring for reauthorization so they can deal with this drone problem. ®