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There's lots of possible reasons that aren't nefarious. Could be training of pilot or crew (I once watched a passenger aircraft orbitting the base I was station
by ajarmst 9y ago
There's lots of possible reasons that aren't nefarious. Could be training of pilot or crew (I once watched a passenger aircraft orbitting the base I was stationed at for most of a day. Turned out it was commercial pilot training and check rides). Could be test flights of equipment and systems for airworthiness certfication. Could be DoT testing navigation aids, etc. If the government wanted to surveil Seattle residents for some reason, I expect the NSA could come up with something a little more subtle.
- partisan 9y agoOne possibility plucked straight from a thriller: a nuke or dirty bomb is somewhere in the area and they are scanning for it.
- nl 9y ago"scanning for it"
- angstrom 9y agoCue head explosion...
- partisan 9y agoThe lack of sense of humor here is stunning. Other comments here are deep in conspiracy-land. Forgive me for contributing a differing, humorous viewpoint.
- yodon 9y agoYou might want to read up on Poe's law[0] before spending too much more time constructing clever ironic posts for threads like this. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
- cr4ig_ 9y agoActually, the government (NNSA, https://nnsa.energy.gov/ https://nnsa.energy.gov/) trains for that on a pretty regular basis. They scan cities for known sources of radiation (hospitals, certain types of industries, natural sources) and map it all out. They'll also go back and conduct drills using those maps to see if they can locate planted radiation sources. A real-life thriller...
- pera 9y agoIndeed, it can be anything, but fyi the government is already surveilling Seattle residents: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/06/fbi-says-utility-pole-surveillance-cam-locations-must-be-kept-secret/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/06/fbi-says-utility...