The Daily Populous Monday December 16th, 2024 evening edition
Authored by cnbc.com and submitted by RebelliousDragon21

The FBI and Department of Homeland Security said on Saturday that ongoing investigations around reported drone sightings over New Jersey have found "many of the reported drone sightings are, in fact, manned aircraft being misidentified as drones."

The investigations have also found no evidence that spotted drones have engaged in illegal activity or malicious acts, and that the United States Coast Guard has not found any evidence of foreign involvement offshore.

"At this point, we have not identified any basis for believing that there's any criminal activity involved, that there's any national security threat, that there's any particular public safety threat or that there's a malicious foreign actor involved in these drones," a DHS official said.

The FBI has been investigating hundreds of reports of drones operating at night since mid-November, most of which are larger than the ones that hobbyists use.

Officials from the FBI said on Thursday that they had seen "no evidence" that the drone sightings "pose a national security or public safety threat."

Sightings have occurred over the Bedminster, New Jersey, golf course owned by President-elect Donald Trump, as well as near a military research facility.

Republican Rep. Mike Waltz of Florida, who is Trump's pick for national security advisor, speculated on where these drones could be coming from, including offshore.

"It's not necessarily somebody that's just on the other end flying it," Waltz said on CBS "Face The Nation" Sunday. "They could be following pre-positioned GPS coordinates. They could be coming from offshore. And we need to take a hard look at our homeland defenses."

Waltz suggested Trump's interest in an "Iron Dome" for America needs to factor in drones. On his campaign trail, Trump promised to build something like Israel's Iron Dome, or a "state-of-the-art missile defense shield."

"President Trump has talked about an Iron Dome for America — that needs to include drones as well. Not just adversarial actions like hypersonic missiles. We need to have an all-of-the-above protection of U.S. airspace," Waltz said.

CORRECTION: This story was revised to reflect that officials from the FBI said on Thursday that they had seen "no evidence" that the drone sightings "pose a national security or public safety threat."

FrankGehryNuman on December 16th, 2024 at 14:51 UTC »

Wonder why all the videos are at night? Because during the day people can easily see theyre manned aircraft and that’s not as tantalizing.

Worldly-Aioli9191 on December 16th, 2024 at 14:35 UTC »

I wonder if they could be possibly connected to one of those big fenced off properties you see near all of the places where drones are reported? You know those big lots with buildings and long strips of concrete and big towers with lots of windows and some kind of radar looking thing on top or near by.

sirboddingtons on December 16th, 2024 at 14:35 UTC »

There are legitimate drones out here, especially those remarked in the area around Fort Dix-MacGuire and out to sea. That's definitely the Navy testing their new toys from PteroDynamics.

But a lot of this is just people not knowing what a drone looks like or sounds like and confusing them with actual aircraft. The mass hysteria spreads and it's like the 2016 clowns everywhere again. People love to wallow in conspiracy and just like contrails from airplanes, our skies are busy enough to see your validation evrwyehre.