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Drones flying nighttime patterns over NE Colorado leave law enforcement stumped
- georgepertot 7y agoIllegal Drones.. to large and flting outside FAA regs. Can it be China ..Russia.. looking for our missle silos ??? Or freindly UFO... scouting out landing spot for mother ship anyway it is not normal to fly and operate such a fleet of drones undocumented in the USA..
- fetus8 7y agoMy partner lives in this area and while I was there on Monday night, at about 8:45pm, we counted about 10 drones flying around. They came in from the west but for the duration of their visit, moved around from west to south, to east to north, in erratic patterns. Given the first sightings were in the more eastern counties of Colorado, and have been moving westward, but remaining in the rural areas still, it seems like someone is searching for something. Did the military lose something? There's an air-force base in Cheyenne, WY, and one down in Colorado Springs...
- macinjosh 7y agoMilitary seems most likely to me. The military have said it is not them but we all know that doesn't make it true. Assuming they are searching for something what could be found after dark? Perhaps something that gives off radioactivity or light in an invisible spectrum? Why would they fly at night other than to help them lay low? Perhaps it is some sort of military drone flight training program?
- fetus8 7y agoYeah, the prevailing thought was it has to be radioactive or tagged with something that can be seen with IR or something. I assume the nighttime thing partially has to do with avoiding migrating Canadian Geese, and of course obscured visibility. It absolutely could be some sort of training program, which seems like the most likely answer, but why lie about it when you've been so readily "caught"?
- caseyf7 7y agoUnlikely that it is for training. There are enough remote military bases where the training could be done without alarming locals.
- saagarjha 7y agoOff topic, but in Reader View the page seems to apply a Caesar Cipher with shift one on the content after a couple of seconds to make reading annoying.
- dmlittle 7y agoMaybe it's an extension you've got installed? I wasn't able to reproduce it (on macOS Safari). What reader are you using?
- saagarjha 7y agoiOS Safari.
- metaphor 7y agoI distinctly recall you griping about ads while reading IEEE articles a few days ago[1]. FYSA wasn't able to replicate the reader view issue with uBO on Firefox, both desktop and mobile. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21850005 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21850005
- saagarjha 7y agoI gripe about ads a lot. As you can probably tell, I’m not a fan of them.
- drdrey 7y agoGot the same issue in iOS Safari
- acidburnNSA 7y agoReader mode for Firefox mobile looks good on android.
- moksly 7y agoI just used trader on iOS safari and had no issues. Weird that it only seem to be affecting some people.
- yellow_lead 7y agoSeems like this is the new norm and while I do feel the skies should be free to an extent I know this would concern me if it were happening over my head.
- ObsoleteNerd 7y agoJust out of curiosity, why would it concern you? I live in a semi-rural tourism-heavy town and get a fair few drones in the vicinity of my house due to a major tourist site nearby, and it never really bothers me unless they fly low enough for the sound to get annoying.
- mobilefriendly 7y agoThey might be using cameras on my home or family. They might be testing some kind of radar or other tech that has a health impact. They might be a competitor assessing my crops. More broadly their very presence is a trespass on my right to live and be left alone on my own property.
- trevyn 7y agoRadar at legal power levels does not have a health impact.
- tomc1985 7y agoEven so a property owner should have a right to decide whether it is used on his property
- frankharv 7y agoI totally agree. Infact the FAA owes me money if they allowed drones below 400ft. This is a taking of my property. I own up to 400 feet. If these drones want to follow the roads that is fine with me. Don't tread on my private property.
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- nickhalfasleep 7y agoSounds like a good way for criminals to find illegal grow ops.
- avs733 7y agoor legal ones for that matter. I don't think they care about the legality of those they are robbing all that much.
- mistersquid 7y ago> I don't think they care about the legality of those they are robbing all that much. People robbed of illegal property usually do not report such losses to the authorities.
- avs733 7y agobut they also would seem to be less likely to have insurance and more likely, as a result, to guard their property with some level of force?
- openthc 7y agoAll cannabis farms I've seen (n>500) have insurance, expensive policy but they still have it. And they are obligated by state law to report any theft
- callalex 7y agoavs is talking about less-than-legal operations which are more likely and incentivized to use less-than legal force to guard their operation.
- pathseeker 7y agoWell then those aren't exactly illegal crops are they? >People robbed of illegal property usually do not report such losses to the authorities.
- tornato7 7y agoDoes anyone have an alternate source? This site is horrendous on mobile.
- shiftpgdn 7y agoMy god this has to be one of the worst news sites I've ever seen. Do these publishers have no shame? I got two full screen video ads with audio on mobile and it dragged my brand new Pixel phone to a crawl.
- gerbler 7y agoThis worked fine in Brave (no ads, rendered fine)
- wuschb 7y agoNextdns.io network wide blocking at dns level... Works like a charm
- darkstar999 7y agoFirefox + ublock origin, my friend
- gregable 7y agohttps://www.denverpost.com/2019/12/23/drones-mystery-colorado/amp/ https://www.denverpost.com/2019/12/23/drones-mystery-colorad...
- folli 7y agoI like the advise to not shoot down the drones, as this can cause a battery fire. Seems very US-American to me.
- cmroanirgo 7y ago> He urged people not to try to shoot the drones down, both because their batteries can cause intense fires and also because shooting a drone is a federal crime. Shooting an inanimate object hovering over your property is illegal? ... on the federal level? I suppose it would have to be, but... Edit: Now I know: "Under Title 18 of the United State Code 32, the sabotage of an unmanned aircraft could carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison." [0] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/32 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/32
- hatsunearu 7y agoI mean, same reason why you can't shoot down an airliner flying 30,000 feet above your house with a homemade Stinger missile or whatever--the airspace is not your property
- soulofmischief 7y agoThis law will have to change as more illegally weaponized drones replace traditional drive-bys or other assassinations.
- luma 7y agoYour ownership of the air rights above your property is limited, but the exact height at which your rights stop isn't always clearly defined. For sure everything above 500' is not yours, but depending on other factors that number may be lower. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_rights#United_States
- ianai 7y agoNot to mention shooting into the air launches the projectile in a very large path that could kill people. Never fire into the air!
- asynchronous13 7y agoAlternate Article: https://sputniknews.com/us/201912241077783862-its-not-santa-mysterious-gang-of-nighttime-drones-flown-over-colorado-raises-alarm/ https://sputniknews.com/us/201912241077783862-its-not-santa-... This sounds like a commercial operation. They're obeying the law, staying below 400ft, and operating in a rural area. It seems like the news articles are doing their best to make this sound bad when there's nothing nefarious going on.
- chktts 7y ago“Obeying the law and not nefarious” doesn’t always mean good.
- draugadrotten 7y ago> They're obeying the law The article states that small drones must be flown during daylight hours according to the regulations. These drones are flown at night, which means they would be in violation of those rules.
- cstejerean 7y agoThese drones don’t sound like small drones, and the article points out that these are likely over 55 lbs, and therefore subject to different regulations.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoThe article also suggests that these are not small drones and thus likely not covered under the regulations mentioned. Also, from the article: "they emerge each night around 7 p.m. and disappear around 10 p.m.". 7-10 p.m. isn't night, it's evening. Yes, in the US it's (probably?) dark by then this time of the year, but maybe they're following some regulation that is defined in terms of time of the day, and not the amount of daylight?
- pathseeker 7y agoSunset is 4:39PM right now in Fort Collins. Night is after sunset in common English: https://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/8954/the-exact-time-of-evening-and-night https://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/8954/the-exact-time-... Also for the FAA: 14 CFR § 1.1: "Night means the time between the end of evening civil twilight and the beginning of morning civil twilight, as published in the Air Almanac, converted to local time."
- loopz 7y agoFrom the article: He urged people not to try to shoot the drones down, both because their batteries can cause intense fires and also because shooting a drone is a federal crime. “It becomes a self-generating fire that burns until it burns itself out,” he said. “If you shoot a drone down over your house and it lands on your house, you might not have a house in 45 minutes.” So these are really vehicles of arson?
- test0483836 7y agoMaybe. In a related note, if you shoot my car until it crashes, it may catch fire and burn everything around it. People probably shouldn't do that either
- plutonorm 7y ago6ft hovering drones? Hovered over a town all night? These are unusual drones. You have to put engineering effort in to keep a drone up for more than 30 minutes and 6ft is really big for a hovering drone.
- crca 7y agoRight? At that point you’re trading off between useful payload and batteries. I’m wondering if maybe they’re witnessing a loiter pattern, and misrepresenting is as a hover. These likely aren’t aerospace Engineers giving quotes here.
- crca 7y agoA 6ft fixed wing drone could fairly easily achieve what’s described in the article if it was really a loiter, not a hover. A multirotor would be an engineering feat.
- duelingjello 7y ago30 ft wingspan powered glider drone made from composite materials would be even more energy-efficient. Multirotor drones have low energy densities and waste it rapidly. Other aspects to consider are that the “drones” are replaced by others as batteries deplete or that the drones aren’t really there as long as people believe. It’s possible that someone is doing this as a hobby for artistic, conspiracy theory “reconnaissance“ or benign data gathering-purposes or conducting some sort of investigation or intelligence gathering.
- anotheryou 7y agoI bet hovering meant a tight circle and those are winged (or maybe even blimps)
- olex 7y agoA 6ft wingspan fixed wing "drone" is easy enough to build for several hours of flight endurance. It won't be able to exactly hover, but it could fly circles at slow speed, making the impression of barely moving if positioned high enough up.
- wrkronmiller 7y agoInteresting that these drones can apparently hover “all night.”
- crca 7y agoWhatever they’re doing out there, it sounds like a lot of fun. Considering that they seem to be following the letter of the law, I’m fairly certain this is some sort of commercial operation. I can see a defense contractor using a large multirotor craft to test some new payloads, like night vision optical or IR sensors. If the 30 minute hover is to be believed, they must be a multirotor of some sort.
- Ididntdothis 7y agoI agree it sounds like fun but it’s probably pretty tone deaf to do so. Whoever does this should quickly clear this up just for their own sake.
- neysofu 7y agoSlightly OT, but I suggest reading the book "Army of none" by Paul Scharre to anyone who wishes to learn more about autonomous aircraft, drones, and the impact of AI on warfare.
- FrozenVoid 7y agoCould it be new Thz radars being tested? They could fit in a large drone easily and be used for close flight formation(they have collision detection) and also to scan nearby terrain(they penetrate vegetation cover). https://e2e.ti.com/blogs_/b/industrial_strength/archive/2017/08/22/using-mmwave-technology-to-enable-sense-and-avoidance-in-drones https://e2e.ti.com/blogs_/b/industrial_strength/archive/2017... https://www.foxtechfpv.com/77ghz-millimeter-wave-obstacle-avoidance-radar.html https://www.foxtechfpv.com/77ghz-millimeter-wave-obstacle-av... (similar stuff costs about 300$, but these drones have probably something much more powerful and heavier, for military or government agencies) https://www.i-micronews.com/radar-to-spot-the-bad-guys-from-on-high/ https://www.i-micronews.com/radar-to-spot-the-bad-guys-from-... (China is developing something similar too) “We mounted a prototype on a drone and recently conducted test flights in Shaanxi province,” Li said. “A typical application of the radar in the future can be drone-based to help with large-scale detection of explosive-carrying terrorists or the placement of improvised explosive devices. This will be much more efficient and safer than deploying a lot of security personnel to do the same work.”
- Razengan 7y ago> to spot the bad guys > large-scale detection > terrorists sigh...
- davewritescode 7y agoWhen I fly a personal drone I have to keep it within line of sight, I thought if you were doing otherwise you’d have to register with the FAA.
- wongarsu 7y agoLots of people are seeing the drones. If you start and land dark it's probably pretty easy to have the drones in your line of sight without being seen yourself.
- onefuncman 7y agoThe first thing I thought of was https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenn_treasure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenn_treasure
- ynniv 7y agoIt may currently be legal, but this isn't an acceptable long term framework. If you're flying below the regulation ceiling, you should need a line of sight operator and landowner approval. Above that you should need a transponder and rough flight plan – just like regular aviation. At no point should an operation be opaque to local law enforcement.
- sathackr 7y agoIf there is no property being damaged, no law being violated, why does law enforcement need to be involved at all? Law enforcement doesn't have to have an answer or info about every single event. If I'm driving a car down the highway, law enforcement doesn't need to know where I am going or why. I'm not breaking any laws and not infringing on anyone's rights. As a pilot I can go fly my plane at any altitude I wish as long as I am not entering any controlled airspace. I don't have to ask or tell anyone what I'm doing. So why do they need to know why I'm flying my drone and where I'm going?
- objclxt 7y ago> As a pilot I can go fly my plane at any altitude I wish as long as I am not entering any controlled airspace. Well, no. That’s not true. Firstly there are rules about the altitude you can fly at when it’s greater than 3000’, and second you are required to file a flight plan any time you are flying IFR.
- test0483836 7y agoThat's not for security or some sense of needing to know what someone is doing. It's so that ATC can effectively route and deconflict traffic. If a UAS is ever operating IFR it must do the same.
- sathackr 7y agoIt was a general statement that applies to the scenario being discussed in the article. If you want to get pedantic, you're also required to file a flight plan if there is some restriction in place requiring such for the area you are flying in. For example a TFR, or operation in an ADIZ or SFRA/FRZ(Washington DC). Or if you are flying internationally.
- nso 7y agoI've been wondering when the first drone-view map of the world would appear. Maybe it's one of the usual suspects?
- stevespang 7y agoIt's the Rusky's, checking out our air defenses before they wreak havoc on us like the Saudi oil refinery !
- growlist 7y ago> A farmhouse sits abandoned on County Road 24 in Yuma County on May 1, 2017 Looks pretty comfy to me. How much does an abandoned farm house in Yuma County go for these days?
- jt2190 7y agoOne possible source: > New swarming drone technology could help find lost hikers, study wildlife CU Boulder Today, Sept 16, 2017 https://www.colorado.edu/today/2017/09/06/new-swarming-drone-technology-could-help-find-lost-hikers-study-wildlife https://www.colorado.edu/today/2017/09/06/new-swarming-drone... Edit: Research and Engineering Center for Unmanned Vehicles (RECVU): https://www.colorado.edu/recuv/ https://www.colorado.edu/recuv/ Edit 2: This has been a fun topic to research! Here’s a link to the list of equipment used by the Integrated Remote and In-Situ Sensing (IRISS) team: https://www.colorado.edu/iriss/content/equipment https://www.colorado.edu/iriss/content/equipment
- tgflynn 7y agoInteresting, have you tried searching the FAA database of UAS Part 107 waivers: https://www.faa.gov/uas/commercial_operators/part_107_waivers/waivers_issued/ https://www.faa.gov/uas/commercial_operators/part_107_waiver... ? If they're non-government/military and are operating legally I think they would most likely have a 107 waiver filed, at least to allow night flying. That does mean they'd still need to be under the weight limit but I think the number of non-107 authorizations, which would allow heavier drones, is very small. Also I'd be surprised if a University research program had the resources to field 17 drones of this size.
- mnemotronic 7y agoTo catch a drone, or drone operator, use another drone. Any chance the drone activity is related to Kim Jong-un's promised Christmas present? NE Colorado has, or had at one time, a few Atlas or Minuteman missile silos.
- mlvljr 7y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCe8iai-SRs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCe8iai-SRs
- mlvljr 7y agoOr could that be searching for the Colorado Bigfoot brought to next level (literally)? ;)
- sanguy 7y agoWe have similar going on in Annapolis Maryland. You can see the lights, particularly the red/green on either side. They seem to just loiter for several hours at a time.
- crocodiletears 7y agoLikewise. This article caught my eye, because it describes a phenomenon similar to one I've observed locally over the past year. I'd be curious about how well this meshes with what you've seen. We have a fleet of (at least) 30 drones operating in a similar manner over Indiana. All of them reliably following paths between fixed waypoints. Upon reaching their waypoints, they tend to loiter place for a bit, change elevation, then move to the next point on their route. They typically come out around 7 pm, and disappear around 5 in the morning. They never fly in poor weather conditions. The bulk of them seem to be Delta-wing aircraft, with lights at each point of their triangular bodies, and another array of three white, rectangular lights beneath them which will often flash, be disabled, or even on in lieu of the lights at their wingtips. I've estimated them to be between 6 and 15ft in wingspan. They have a forward-swept vertical control surface with a red light at its apex, that I've variably seen at the top, and the bottom of the craft. I've seen them fly forwards, backwards, and taxi side to side in rotating triangular formations of four, with one at the epicenter. They typically fly around 50mph. They first appeared in the large numbers around south-central indiana July of 2018, but operate at lower densities across much of the southern half of the state. I've always attributed it to the nearby naval warfare research center, due to the lack of public comment on the part of our local government, or regulatory bodies.
- jlgaddis 7y ago> ... over Indiana. > ... the nearby naval warfare research center, ... I'd be interested in more details (either here or via e-mail to my username at gmail) as to where you've seen these flying. I'm basically in between Bloomington and Crane (which is, I assume, where you're referring to) and have several friends who work at various levels in law enforcement in the area and even more friends who work at Crane. This is the first I've heard of anything like this in the area, though.
- michaelbuckbee 7y agoMy thought is that they're nongovernmental groups looking for illegal marijuana growing operations that they'll competitively harvest. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/09/the-secret-pot-growing-operations-in-americas-cornfields/375913/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/09/the-s...
- tgflynn 7y agoIf what they're doing is tied to illegal activity, you wouldn't think they'd be flying with collision avoidance lights.
- michaelbuckbee 7y agoPlausible deniability - they’re just doing ‘monitoring for deforestation’ or doing ‘speculative land investment’ if anybody does track them down.
- godelski 7y agoIf this is such a high concern, why don't they go on a fox hunt? HAM is pretty popular in rural areas and HAMs love fox hunts. With the frequency and length that these things are up, they should be able to close in on the operators fairly quickly.
- 5bolts 7y agoamateur radio is pretty popular in rural areas. While i guess the pork product is as well. and as a ham we don't capitalize it, its not an acronym.
- clort 7y agowell it came from initials of Hertz, Armstrong & Marconi all of whom were instrumental in radio wave research. I think that counts as an acronym but when it is a common word it is often written in lower case
- aaron695 7y agoNo doubt the same brand of drone use in Gatwick, hysteria. The car following a star is a classic. It used to be aliens, now it's drones, interesting culture shift.
- aSplash0fDerp 7y ago<Here. Hold the keys to my 45' RV while I learn to night fly a group of drones on personal recon missions. America is pretty great isn't it? Just don't try to bring a liquid on a public flight and you're a model citizen.