Update: NY Gov. Kathy Hochul announced the deployment of a federal government drone detection system in New York after Stewart Airport was shut down on Saturday, Dec. 14 due to mystery drone activity. The incursion, a clear safety risk for those engaging in air travel, directly contradicted claims from the federal government that the drones were not a safety or security threat.
Over the weekend, a video by John Ferguson, CEO of military drone manufacturer Saxon Aerospace went viral, claiming the “mystery drones” have been shrouded in secrecy because they were deployed to detect radioactivity being emitted from one or more hidden “rogue” nuclear weapons. Others speculated it was a preemptive drill to gauge public reaction to drones being deployed for such a purpose in the future.
In any case, public consensus was building around the common-sense idea the US government was aware of the drones’ origin despite their denials, with incoming President Trump concurring, “The government knows what is happening. For some reason, they don’t want to comment. And I think they’d be better off saying what it is our military knows and our president knows.”
All eyes on the sky!
Unexplained drone sightings that have left New Jersey residents (and indeed, many Americans) bewildered for weeks have reached the Hudson Valley, as Albany County and lower Hudson Valley officials confirmed receipt of reports of several citizens witnessing the drones on Thursday evening. Residents in Goshen and the Town of Wallkill shared their eyewitness accounts with authorities, including video recordings.
The drones that have gripped headlines for weeks typically resemble small planes two or three times the size of a typical commercial drone. They have been spotted over residential areas as well as military installations, usually between dusk and 11pm. They were first spotted on Nov. 18, and sightings have been steadily creeping their way north in the direction of Ulster County.
“We have been in contact with our state and local law enforcement partners regarding this,” Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus said on social media Thursday night. “There is no known threat to public safety at this time and we are continuing to closely monitor this situation,” he added.
Neuhaus said he found it “alarming” the FAA had not registered the reported drone flights, and though he was “concerned”, he urged the public not to panic and to send videos of any sightings to his office instead of calling 911. He added he had alerted the Pentagon and planned to meet with federal and state authorities on Friday.
Hovering questions
The FBI and Department of Homeland Security said in a joint statement Thursday they had “no evidence at this time” of threats posed by the drone sightings, and have denied their origin is from a “foreign nexus”.
New Jersey Congressman Jeff Van Drew claimed earlier this week that he had information from “very high sources” that the drones came from an “Iranian mothership” stationed off the East Coast. He also claimed a Coast Guard ship had been chased by dozens of drones.
Deputy Defense Secretary Sabrina Singh was quick to shoot down this theory, saying “There is no Iranian ship off the coast of the United States and there is no so-called mothership launching drones towards the United States.” However, Drew doubled down on Friday, saying his sources relayed the more specific claim that three Iranian drone motherships were stationed off-coast.
Air of mystery
Many of the earliest drone sightings occurred in the vicinity of Picatinny Arsenal, a cutting-edge military research center in North Jersey, which prompted the base commander to issue a statement the confirmed the sightings but clarified “we can confirm that they are not the result of any Picatinny Arsenal-related activities.”
Homeland Security officials also confirmed unmanned craft flew over Naval Weapons Station Earle, Picatinny Arsenal and the National Guard, the Asbury Park Press reported. However, national security spokesman John Kirby, quoting the joint FBI/DHS press release, seemed to contradict this confirmation in a press briefing Thursday, stating, “there are no reported or confirmed drone sightings in any restricted airspace.”
Kirby added that many of the purported sightings were “actually manned aircraft that are being operated lawfully.”
New York officials react
Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer and US Senators Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker and Andy Kim sent a letter to the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the Federal Aviation Administration on Thursday pleading for more information regarding the coordination between federal and local law enforcement. It states: “The potential safety and security risks posed by these drones in civilian areas is especially pertinent considering recent drone incursions at sensitive military sites in and outside of the continental United States over the past year.”
New York State Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Friday she was launching an investigation into the drone incursion in our state.
Are drone origins truly unknown or just unexplained?
Other politicians were less delicate.
Staten Island President Vito Fossella told reporters a drone flew over his house, and suggested “there should be an executive order to let people shoot them down.”
Dawn Fantasia, a New Jersey assemblywoman, said, “To state that there is no known or credible threat is incredibly misleading.”
“It’s hard to understand how with the technology we have we aren’t able to track these devices to determine origin, and this makes me much more concerned about our capabilities more broadly when it comes to drone detection and counter measures,” said New Jersey Senator Andy Kim in an X post.
Experts such as professor Pramod Abichandani, who heads the Advanced Air Mobility Lab at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, suggested the drones were being operated anonymously by private commercial entities such as defense contractors and/or a classified US military program. “The simplest explanation is the correct explanation,” he said.
Some online sleuths suggested video evidence pointed to a cutting-edge military drone such as the Sparrowhawk or an XP-4, while others adamant in their claims that the tri-state area was being visited by aliens.
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