Mystery of drone sightings over Colorado could have a simple explanation

[shorttimer]

Looks like secretive Air Force program might be responsible...

Colorado drone mystery sightings finally might be solved

The mysterious drone swarms spotted over Colorado that have vexed the governor, law enforcement and residents might not be so mysterious after all.

gazette.com

 

[Rangerider]

Looks like secretive Air Force program might be responsible...

Colorado drone mystery sightings finally might be solved

The mysterious drone swarms spotted over Colorado that have vexed the governor, law enforcement and residents might not be so mysterious after all.

gazette.com

That article doesn't hold water for me. Why would the AF conduct 'secret' anti-drone tests at night with their lights on so that people could see them? The secret would be out don't you think? They could just as easily conduct them during the day or just turn their lights off and avoid so much publicity. Why use such big drones and not little ones that make much less noise? Why would they(drone operators) turn on their spot lights shining downward if they want to be 'secretive'? Was there an FAA warning to other drone operators not to operate in that area? I don't think so. Somehow the AF conducting large scale drone operations at night to protect missile silos not in the same area from potential drone attacks just doesn't seem to make sense to me although it is the best possible explanation so far.

 

[jac1957]

My question is, why doesn't anyone have any idea who is piloting these things. With all of the tech available for keeping this country safe. you would think someone would find the pilots.

 

[Cymruflyer]

If they can all see them flying why doesn't someone just watch where they all fly off to when the batteries are running low? This all sound suspicious to me.

 

[jac1957]

Allegedly these drones are supposed to be around 6 ft (long? wide?). If so I think we can be sure these aren't recreational users.

 

[theDRONEranger]

My question is, why doesn't anyone have any idea who is piloting these things. With all of the tech available for keeping this country safe. you would think someone would find the pilots.

They haven’t signed on to the Drone ID program yet!

 

[jac1957]

They haven’t signed on to the Drone ID program yet!

And I doubt if they would. Seems like they want to keep their identity secret.

 

[sar104]

My question is, why doesn't anyone have any idea who is piloting these things. With all of the tech available for keeping this country safe. you would think someone would find the pilots.

Maybe no one with the necessary equipment has tried to do that yet. Or maybe they are flying autonomously, with no control signal to track. And if they are military or national security exercises then they are likely classified, and so the denials of knowledge by the FAA, HS and DoD won't reflect what they might actually know.

 

[Rangerider]

In my opinion this is a Psy-Op by the FAA/AF & corporations that is not coincidentally occurring at same time as the Draconian FAA NPRM to destroy the recreational drone community. The 'mystery' drones are reportedly up to 6 ft in span(not recreational), operate at night (needing FAA waiver), hover with spot lights on for up to 10 minutes at a time(big batteries), fly in coordinated grid patterns(programmed routes), make lots of noise. You can't tell me that the FAA can't figure out what large fleet of registered drones are operating under a night time waiver. You can't tell me that the drones can't be tracked, that is ridiculous. Put some good storm chasers on them and if you have several fanning out in several directions it should be a simple investigative task. The FEDS are just trying to terrorize certain people into reacting with cries for more drone regulation to stop these 'alien' privacy-breaking spies in the sky in my opinion. I thought that the big drones all had some kind of id that could be tracked much like the manned airplanes have called ADSB. Some witnesses are reporting that the 'mysterious' drones are turning off their position lights and disappearing! That would appear to be a violation of the regs.
If you ask me, some corporate operator is flying the drones, the Air Force is allowing the rumors of their involvement as some 'secret' testing for terrorist attacks as a cover story and the FAA is happy to use the 'mystery' for their purposes to destroy the recreational drone community. They don't like the competition that this would give to the commercial drone operators. It is all about making the sky's 'safe' for the coming commercial drone fleets. This is just a Psy-Op if you ask me.
Link to one article: 'People Do Not Like the Unknown.' Here's What To Know About The Mystery Drones Hovering Over Rural Colorado and Nebraska

 

[theDRONEranger]

If they are the Gov’t, then it logically follows: they do NOT know what they are doing, why they are doing it, where they have been, or where they are going!

 

[theDRONEranger]

In my opinion (my thread on this was deleted) this is a Psy-Op by the FAA/AF & corporations that is not coincidentally occurring at same time as the Draconian FAA NPRM to destroy the recreational drone community. The 'mystery' drones are reportedly up to 6 ft in span(not recreational), operate at night (needing FAA waiver), hover with spot lights on for up to 10 minutes at a time(big batteries), fly in coordinated grid patterns(programmed routes), make lots of noise. You can't tell me that the FAA can't figure out what large fleet of registered drones are operating under a night time waiver. You can't tell me that the drones can't be tracked, that is ridiculous. Put some good storm chasers on them and if you have several fanning out in several directions it should be a simple investigative task. The FEDS are just trying to terrorize certain people into reacting with cries for more drone regulation to stop these 'alien' privacy-breaking spies in the sky in my opinion. I thought that the big drones all had some kind of id that could be tracked much like the manned airplanes have called ADSB.
If you ask me, some corporate operator is flying the drones, the Air Force is allowing the rumors of their involvement as some 'secret' testing for terrorist attacks as a cover story and the FAA is happy to use the 'mystery' for their purposes to destroy the recreational drone community. They don't like the competition that this would give to the commercial drone operators. It is all about making the sky's 'safe' for the coming commercial drone fleets. This is just a Psy-Op if you ask me.

Shhhhhhh, it’s a highly classified secret! If they told us, they’d have to kill us!

 

[Rangerider]

Shhhhhhh, it’s a highly classified secret! If they told us, they’d have to kill us!

That's right! It's so secretive that they do it in plain sight with a drone fleet swarm visible to lots of people. They swarm in with lights blazing and hover for long periods of time with spot lights on!! Right! It is not meant to be secretive but is meant to fan a public uproar for more control of those 'dangerous' drone spies in the sky. Ha!

 

[hiflyer201]

put it in the same file as Crop Circles..the circular file

 

[mavicn00b]

Colorado was trying to put on a drone light show - but due to budgetary constraints they can only afford 2-3 drones

 

[Meta4]

If you ask me, some corporate operator is flying the drones, the Air Force is allowing the rumors of their involvement as some 'secret' testing for terrorist attacks as a cover story and the FAA is happy to use the 'mystery' for their purposes to destroy the recreational drone community. They don't like the competition that this would give to the commercial drone operators. It is all about making the sky's 'safe' for the coming commercial drone fleets. This is just a Psy-Op if you ask me.

You've joined a lot of dots there ... including quite a few that don't exist.

 

[jac1957]

And as usual. When the news media does articles either on the TV or in print. They show a mavic, phantom or inspire or some recreational drone. None of which are 6 ft long or wide. I wish the news outlets would state that the drones over Colorado ARE NOT recreational drones. People are paranoid about recreational drones so as it is. Maybe we should all make an effort to start referring to our drones as quads or quad copters. When people in general think drones they think military equipment. I know before i became interested in quads the first thing that came to mind when I heard the word drone was the military drone.

 

[Meta4]

Maybe we should all make an effort to start referring to our drones as quads or quad copters. When people in general think drones they think military equipment. I know before i became interested in quads the first thing that came to mind when I heard the word drone was the military drone.

Maybe back in 2010, but recreational drones have been around long enough that people know the difference now.

 

[anotherlab]

And as usual. When the news media does articles either on the TV or in print. They show a mavic, phantom or inspire or some recreational drone. None of which are 6 ft long or wide. I wish the news outlets would state that the drones over Colorado ARE NOT recreational drones. People are paranoid about recreational drones so as it is. Maybe we should all make an effort to start referring to our drones as quads or quad copters. When people in general think drones they think military equipment. I know before i became interested in quads the first thing that came to mind when I heard the word drone was the military drone.

The problem with using "quad copter" is that it doesn't roll off the tongue as easily as "drone". And "quad" by itself is too ambiguous. The term "drone" has too much traction now, that ship has sailed. These days people are smart enough to know the difference between something that you can buy at BestBuy for $500 and a $4 million Predator from the good people at General Atomics.

 

[Huckleberry]

In my opinion this is a Psy-Op by the FAA/AF & corporations that is not coincidentally occurring at same time as the Draconian FAA NPRM to destroy the recreational drone community.

Does amazon have a facility in Denver?

 

[anotherlab]

Does amazon have a facility in Denver?

They have a bunch of fullfillment centers in the Denver area, but not development centers.

(image from Freightos)

If Amazon was testing drones, you would think that they would be doing it near a development center and hopefully at a designated BLOS corridor (like the one in Upstate NY).