A spike in alleged drone sightings along the East Coast triggered a flurry of panicked calls for an investigation Friday from residents and state lawmakers, even as public officials emphasize that the planes in question, in fact, they fly legally and a retired port authority Aviation expert tells Fox News Digital the fears are overblown.
Drone complaints it started to rain last month in New Jersey, where witnesses and residents first began reporting drone sightings in coastal areas, including Cape May, a picturesque town located outside Atlantic City.
More recently, lawmakers in New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Maryland have reported new alleged drone sightings in their home states, with some witnesses alleging that the planes in question were the “size of cars” or had been seen flying over infrastructure sensitive or in restricted airspace. .
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat, told reporters Friday that there were written to President Biden to share concerns about new reports of sightings of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) in New Jersey airspace, and called for more federal resources to investigate the issue.
“It has become clear that more resources are needed to fully understand what is behind this activity,” Murphy wrote in the letter.
DRONE MYSTERY: NEW JERSEY OWNERS THREATEN TO TAKE MATTER INTO THEIR OWN HANDS IF THE GOVERNMENT DOESN’T ACT
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke, File)
Other state lawmakers have gone even further, calling for the Department of Homeland Security and the FBI to join their investigations into the drones, with one Garden State lawmaker urging that the objects be “shot down” if necessary.
“We are literally being invaded by drones,” Pequannock Mayor Ryan Herbwe told reporters Wednesday night after a New Jersey town hall meeting.
“We have no idea who is doing [this] and where they come from.”
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., issued a statement Friday citing concerns “about the potential for these unmanned aerial vehicles, many of which are as large as a car, to disrupt air traffic and, more alarmingly, , are used maliciously”. threaten national security.”
These comments have added to a growing collective sense of panic, but a panic that many in the law enforcement community consider unfounded and unnecessary.
White House national security communications adviser John Kirby sought to calm these fears, emphasizing during a press conference Thursday that “there is no evidence at this time that the reported drone sightings pose a security threat.” national or public security, or have a foreign nexus. ”
Other members of the law enforcement community also echoed this sentiment. Retired Port Authority Police Detective Lt. John Ryan told Fox News Digital in an interview Friday that the increase in activity is likely due to two things.
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Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., appears next to a photo of drones reported in Connecticut. Blumenthal is among lawmakers who have pushed for action on unmanned aerial systems (UAS).
The first, he said, is that drones are a rapidly evolving technology that has seen a boom in both recreational and commercial use in the United States over the past 10 years. Federal data on drone registration reflects this sharp increase in use, most, if not all, of which are legal.
Federal data on drone registration reflects this sharp increase in use: As of October of this year, there were more than 790,000 drones registered with the Federal Aviation Association (FAA) and nearly 400,000 commercial drones registered.
This is “just to give you an idea” of the magnitude of the number of legal drones in the United States, said Ryan, whose extensive law enforcement career included serving for a decade as an emergency officer. commander of special operations duty at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport and later the director of the Port Authority, whose role includes oversight of all transportation facilities, including Kennedy, LaGuardia and all other airports and ports in the area.
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A map showing drone sightings in New Jersey.
The second mistake, Ryan said, is that the people in question are asking the wrong authorities for help.
“The mistake I see people make is that they go to the wrong agencies and ask these questions,” he added.
The FAA is the federal agency in charge of registering drones and other US aircraft. It is also responsible for monitoring recreational and commercial drone use in the US.
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“In New Jersey, they’ve been asking the FBI, they’ve been asking the Department of Homeland Security; they’ve been asking everyone except the people they should be asking,” Ryan said.
The Pentagon also reiterated this view, noting that an initial assessment had shown that the drones were not from another country and were not shot down because they were not considered a threat to national security.
Kirby echoed this sentiment Thursday. Asked whether the United States would consider banning the use of drones in its airspace, he told reporters: “I don’t know if we’re at a stage where we’re considering that” as a policy option.
