More than 5,000 drone sightings have been reported in New Jersey recently (WCBS/YouTube).
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a temporary ban on drone flights in more than 20 New Jersey communities — prohibiting them from entering their local airspace until Jan. 17 for “special security reasons” — as authorities investigate over 5,000 reported sightings that have come in the last few weeks, according to FAA officials, sparking widespread speculation.
“At the request of federal security partners, the FAA published 22 Temporary Flight Restrictions (TFRs) prohibiting drone flights over critical New Jersey infrastructure,” the FAA told Law&Crime in a statement Thursday. The agency’s official ban alert calls for temporary flight restrictions “from the surface up to and including 400 feet AGL (above ground level),” per the online description.
“No UAS (unmanned aircraft systems) operations are authorized,” the alert says.
Over the past several weeks, countless drone sightings have come from people living in the Garden State. Theories have run rampant about what could be happening, with some believing they’re aliens trying to make contact and others spouting possibilities of a nuclear bomb being lost, which the feds are trying to find using the drones, according to online conspiracy theorists — and even a few government officials.
This is the first video about these drones that has got me genuinely concerned.
— Joe Rogan (@joerogan) December 15, 2024
“What might they be looking for? Maybe that’s radioactive material,” said Belleville Mayor Michael Melham during a Tuesday appearance on Fox’s “Good Day New York.”
The link that people keep trying to make between the drone sightings and radioactive material is related to a Dec. 5 alert from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which stated that a piece of medical equipment for cancer scans had been “lost in transit” three days earlier.
“It was a shipment,” Melham said. “It arrived at its destination. The container was damaged, and it was empty.”
Speaking in a press release Thursday, the FAA said an initial probe of the drone reports turned up no evidence of anything nefarious or extraterrestrial going on.
“Having closely examined the technical data and tips from concerned citizens, we assess that the sightings to date include a combination of lawful commercial drones, hobbyist drones, and law enforcement drones, as well as manned fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and stars mistakenly reported as drones,” the agency said. “We have not identified anything anomalous and do not assess the activity to date to present a national security or public safety risk over the civilian airspace in New Jersey or other states in the northeast.
A community ban list provided to Law&Crime by the FAA shows three of New Jersey’s largest cities on its list for restricted airspace for the next month — Camden, Elizabeth and Jersey City — in addition to other popular communities like Clifton, Bayonne, Edison South Brunswick, North Brunswick, Gloucester City, Winslow Township, Evesham, Cedar Grove, Metuchen, Westampton, Branchburg, Sewaren, Harrison and Kearny.
Drones operating for national defense will be permitted to fly in the area, but that’s it for now.
“There are more than one million drones lawfully registered with the FAA in the United States and there are thousands of commercial, hobbyist and law enforcement drones lawfully in the sky on any given day,” the FAA said Thursday. “With the technology landscape evolving, we expect that number to increase over time. FBI has received tips of more than 5,000 reported drone sightings in the last few weeks with approximately 100 leads generated, and the federal government is supporting state and local officials in investigating these reports.”
As a way to sniff out drones in violation, the FAA said it sent “advanced detection technology to the region” and “trained visual observers” to help assist local law enforcement and federal authorities.
