Tucson copter cop says mysterious, ‘sophisticated’ super-drone ‘like no other’
dronedj.com
dronedj.com
Look at the nearby Davis-Monthan Air Force base: https://www.google.com/maps/search/Davis-Monthan+Air+Force+B...
A plethora of planes, helicopters, and 3 big doppler radar domes.
I guarantee the air force were tracking it, probably because it's their baby. The only reason we even heard about it is the police reports, and they weren't in the loop.
The Air Force is not guaranteed to disclose what they do to the local cops, and might use them as a training exercise in fact.
You can see a bunch of (I think) B-52's with their tails chopped off. Iirc, they did that to comply with arms reduction treaties with what was the Soviet Union. They left them out in the desert like that so that spy satellites (and now Google maps) can spot them and verify that, yes, those planes were really destroyed.
1. This drone does not fit the description of any known DOD drone, so you should assume it’s classified. The DOD is meticulous about only flying classified aircraft in restricted airspace where they can prevent prying eyes and inadvertent attention. Tucson is not immediately close to any of the usual hotspots for classified aircraft (Area 51 for example).
2. The article describes the drone buzzing the original CBP chopper as well as flying an orbit around the police helicopter. It is reasonable to suggest that a collision between the drone and either of those helicopters would be fatal for the pilot. No military pilot I know would ever create the type of risky scenario as described here.
3. Classified and unclassified aircraft are not just operated by a dude that hops into a plane or sits down at a drone console. They’re planned out. They’re also not operated in a vacuum. If your scenario of a classified drone operating in this airspace were true, and the drone was picked up by a friendly chopper, the operator would most likely immediately land safely and have someone reach out to the pilots and let them know not to mess with the aircraft. They would certainly not go rogue and risk a major accident or fatality.
4. I consider it highly unlikely the DOD would ever use other agency resources to unwittingly run training Ops. That seems like a career-ending move.
Being full of human beings out military is fallible.
>Also, I would have to imagine that any supervisor involved would have immediately contacted the civilian agency involved to say "it's us, please back off."
I would imagine them doing no such thing. Most of the nuclear program wasn't disclosed to anyone until Kodak discovered it on their own.
Our military has a host of secrets and everyone in it does their sincere best to keep them, particularly when ordered to.
>would have immediately contacted the civilian agency involved to say "it's us, please back off."
If the civilian agencies - or any entity really - doesn't have "need to know", they won't be told a thing. Based on this thing escaping, they don't need to know anything at all.
Or you're wrong and it's not what you think it is, but seeing all your replies it's clear you're already set on what to believe.
I expected better epistemic humility from a username like that.
That depends fully on what type of military pilots you know.
“Negative Ghost Rider, the pattern is full.”
* WWWWWHHHHhhhoooooosh! *
"Goddamn that guy."
I think the most likely explanation is somewhere between. Plenty of private companies work on tech that is then sold to the DOD and classified (and they continue to produce for the military), but before it is released it is not technically classified.
Here's a video of CPB buzzing a crowd in a helicopter kicking up rocks at them. This happened 2 weeks ago. https://twitter.com/i/status/1401952522319843329
The idea of idiot pilots doing asshole things to other people is par for the course. No reason why this couldn't be military assholes either.
While I agree with your general sentiments, I vehemently disagree with that point. I have no doubt there are endless undocumented instances, but here's a pretty major public one:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Cavalese_cable_car_cras...
>1. This drone does not fit the description of any known DOD drone, so you should assume it’s classified.
I wouldn't. And I've held a secret clearance. Not fitting any "known" DoD drone means absolutely nothing.
>The DOD is meticulous about only flying classified aircraft in restricted airspace where they can prevent prying eyes and inadvertent attention.
Except for when they aren't.
>3. Classified and unclassified aircraft are not just operated by a dude that hops into a plane or sits down at a drone console. They’re planned out. They’re also not operated in a vacuum. If your scenario of a classified drone operating in this airspace were true, and the drone was picked up by a friendly chopper, the operator would most likely immediately land safely and have someone reach out to the pilots and let them know not to mess with the aircraft.
You can always spot a layman talking about this when they talk about things as "classified" or "unclassified". Classified what is the relevant question. Confidential? Secret? Top Secret? ???
>4. I consider it highly unlikely the DOD would ever use other agency resources to unwittingly run training Ops.
It's a good simulation of what a similarly advanced country might have on hand. The US, China, and Russia routinely conduct "response time" checks by putting a proverbial toe in each other's airspace to test response times and responses in general. The idea that they would never do it with American organizations is presumptuous. Our respective militaries pay close attention it when it happens but aren't particularly alarmed by it because it's not rare.
I think point 4 was argued against with some actual reasoning.
Whose military?
Lots of US military bases in Arizona, certainly spies must be everywhere there.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1998_Cavalese_cable_car_cras...
20 dead, pilot destroyed a videotape filmed from the plane during the crash.
Just saying quite hard taking pics of moving objects even though cameras are quite good...
Some UFO story.
[1] https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/41223/tucson-mystery-d...
[2] https://www.thedrive.com/content-b/message-editor%2F16243890...
Testing occurs with a manufacturer before it reaches unit level. No program manager or contract pilot is going to risk his ticket or the program integrity to do a test like this. Or worst of all, not get paid because of a program deviation or black mark.
Once a vehicle reaches unit level it is typically in inventory with somewhat mundane and scripted test patterns for personnel to stay sharp.
The guy saying he has (had?) a secret clearance and they do testing "except when they don't" want to follow the rules is watching too much Netflix.
> Look at the nearby Davis-Monthan Air Force base
The question is whose air force UAV?
It's not like it would be the first time a military (or even the US military, probably) hid info from their civilian counterparts.
(Of course, a much less cynical explanation is some sort of drug smuggling. How much batteries and drugs could you fit on a ~15sqft quadcopter?)
By the contemporary, common use of the word, drone fits. Someone made a large scale version if the story is accurate.
I have no idea where that guy got the info but he's presumably in the area/industry there.
Even if you think it was aliens remotely piloting the craft, it's still a drone.
Not particularly relevant but fun to watch: a purpose built, turbine-powered rc aircraft flying at 450mph and executing turns that would probably kill a human pilot.
https://youtu.be/DPGDAZyQ44k?t=150
Onboard: https://youtu.be/H74rXkQBeR4
I say drone only because it seemed about that size, didn’t see it beyond the general shape and darker color unfortunately.
Plus we tracked it far into the distance as it moved steadily at a consistent height.
If I had any doubt it could be a laser pointer I’d have noted it, but it definitely wasn’t.
[0] https://www.huffpost.com/entry/ufo-nearcollision-with-army-h...
Two of the three videos can be explained away just by reading the data overlaid on the video and applying some middle school-level geometry to it.
You're saying the military is unable to distinguish lense glare from an actual object.
Multiple systems, radar, eyeballs.
Come on.
I'm not saying that. I know they can, and I claim they're withholding the relevant data and their real conclusions on purpose, because they want this to be a story.
My current belief is that those three videos are primarily technology demonstrators, released purposefully by the US military, in order to show off in front of foreign powers. For example, the GOFAST video is the one where data overlaid on the image + basic geometry tells you they're tracking a bird, but the subtext of that video is that US fighter planes can track a bird-sized object, from 6 kilometers away, while flying half the speed of sound. This is what Russian and Chinese militaries see when watching that video.
I haven't followed all the official comments on this thoroughly, but IIRC, what we have is, confirmation these videos are real, information that the military wants pilots to be more eager to come forward when they see something unusual, and that some information has been given to some people in the Congress. You mention "Multiple systems, radar", but I've only heard it being said they "saw something" - no actual details have been released, as far as I know.
So there's that, plus a bunch of people recounting their experiences and thoughts in front of cameras; the snippets I've seen look like the usual bullshit that is aired on US cable - I don't trust that at all, because since when anything trustworthy was first revealed in one of those places? Other than that, there's a few people making lots of money playing this up as bona fide alien encounter - they are the ones that drive publicity for this topic.
(And to answer the possible questions about why the US would want to show off superior capabilities - ever since nuclear-tipped ICBMs became a thing, it's in the interest of all nuclear powers to stay in lockstep wrt. their military capabilities, lest one of the party decides they're so far behind their only chance for survival is a preemptive nuclear strike.)
So your explanation implies multiple conspiracies mixed with sensor errors, lying or actually crazy pilots, and a general pretension of being clueless, to send a message of having some advanced technology you could easily publish about in a military tech journal?
The object(s) in question remain unexplained.
Making definitive claims about the Nimitz incident means you have a lot more reading to do.
"As for the lights that the Marines saw six kilometers away, Shoup believes they were actually seeing lights from a town seventeen kilometers distant. They had misread the lights of a distant city as headlamps from a much closer convoy. Shoup attributes the perception that these headlamps appeared to be moving to a phenomenon called “autokinesis.” He explains, “When you stare at lights long enough in the dark, it looks like they are moving. That’s autokinesis.” What it boils down to is that under clear skies, in open terrain with almost no vegetation, the Marines don’t have a clue what’s out there beyond the perimeter. Even with the best optics and surveillance assets in the world, no one knows what happened to nearly 10,000 pounds of bombs and missiles dropped a few kilometers outside the encampment."
I first heard a sound like a swarm of bees overhead but looked up to see the drone.
It took off southbound at a high rate of speed in the same flight path that the police helicopters use.
I have no idea if this is related but I thought it was very odd for a drone to be flying at that time over a heavily populated area near the University of Arizona.
I wonder how effective an rf jammer would have been.
https://www.nasa.gov/langley/ten-engine-electric-plane-compl...
[0] https://www.northropgrumman.com/wp-content/uploads/BAT_Datas...
It won’t have a flight time of more than a few minutes, though. For that, you’d need a fixed wing, or a non-lipo power source (like, say, hydrogen)