4 ms·

> ... the “mystery drone” wave also elicited serious expressions of concern from at least two U.S. senators and attention from Colorado’s governor and state pub

> ... the “mystery drone” wave also elicited serious expressions of concern from at least two U.S. senators and attention from Colorado’s governor and state public safety agency. What concern? > ... absence of evidence of criminal intent, or of a proximate threat to military assets or other critical infrastructure. Once the aerial activity stopped, it appears that both federal and state agencies quickly dropped the matter And rightly so. Interesting oddity, but pointless use of federal investigatory resources.

mlthoughts2018 6y ago
It don’t see why you’re puzzled. It sure sounds very concerning to me. It was concerning enough to many people that they reported it, including law enforcement personnel. Given this, it makes complete sense someone might choose to investigate.
- jagged-chisel 6y ago
  You didn’t explain the concern. Starting an investigation while the activity is on-going in an attempt to ascertain potential threats: fine. Continuing an investigation for unfounded “concern” and curiosity’s sake after the activity stops and there was no crime committed: wasteful.
  - wastedhours 6y ago
    Because whomever was flying the drones might do it again. If they can ascertain who it was and what they were doing, they'll be able to rule out any malicious future intent to their actions. I'm not sure anybody really wants a number of unidentified flying objects (in their literal sense) in the air at night with noone knowing where they came from or what they might be doing. I don't consider that "unfounded" concern, think it's quite valid on the spectrum of concerns actually. Seems like a reasonable use of resources to get to the bottom of it (albeit, perhaps not their full-time work). Not every investigation will succeed, and the outcomes can often be that nothing can be done. You can only get to that by doing the work though.
    - tfigment 6y ago
      If no law was being broken then investigation sounds like harassment to me. While it could be annoying there are a lot of thing that are annoying that are no illegal. I'd love to take away the power tools from my neighbor but they are not doing anything wrong and should not be subject to official inquiry just in case they could be.
      - wastedhours 6y ago
        Agree with that, however this is a case with very little precedent - there needed to be an investigation to get to the conclusion nothing was wrong as it obviously did concern a lot of people. For me, that's part of the role of these bodies, ensure that something that looks sketchy actually (or potentially in this case) isn't. It's unchartered territory for people to have random flying things buzzing over the skies at night (and feel it's an entirely valid thing to be concerned about), whereas an annoying neighbour with some tools is well established.
        UncleEntity 6y ago
        > Agree with that, however this is a case with very little precedent - there needed to be an investigation to get to the conclusion nothing was wrong as it obviously did concern a lot of people. Anything that isn't specifically illegal is legal by default. They determined no illegal activities were conducted by flying a fleet of drones in a low-population rural area so...
        wastedhours 6y ago
        > They determined no illegal activities were conducted by flying a fleet of drones in a low-population rural area so... And they determined that by investigating (which is what we're discussing here). I'm not arguing about it's legality, just that they determined its legality by investigating something reported by genuinely concerned people.
    - 14 6y ago
      I have to disagree. You sound like the person in the video linked in one comment. She called the drones creepy. Why are they creepy? You don’t say creepy but you call them “unidentified flying objects” the article clearly states they are drones. We just don’t know who flew them and that bothers you. Also you think it is a good use of public resources to drive around and identify people not committing crimes flying drones after the fact. Why do you fear drones so much? I mean if they were flying into your yard hovering by a window I could see being upset but some guy flying drones in formation way in the sky and people freak out, why? It could be as simple as a drone enthusiast taking it to the next level. As I type this I feel my tone will come across as negative but I honestly hope you can bring some discussion to my questions. I have only ever played with cheap drones my kids own. Awesome fun. But slowly the drone world is being chipped away with more regulation some good but some implemented by people out of fear. If you are in my area and you see a drone in the sky it’s just me having fun and probably if you watch long enough I will put it in a tree. I don’t want the police searching around and bothering me especially after it was confirmed by the FAA that no crime was committed. Otherwise it sounds like harassment for something they don’t like.
oxymoran 6y ago
It’s not concerning, or even worth trying to solve the mystery, to you that we can’t identify a fleet of flying drones that are not from our military and that seem to be slightly more advanced than current consumer drones.(hovering silently for hours in high winds/storms). That’s just not worth your time? The drones could have been doing any number of nefarious things, but let’s not worry about it right? It could have been a foreign adversary for crying out loud.
- na85 6y ago
  First, who's "we"? Do you work in national defense? Second, how do you know they can't identify it, when there are several emails being withheld from the FOIA request? To me, that's a dead giveaway it's a CIA project or something. Third, if a foreign adversary has the capability to maliciously land and take off from rural airports in Nebraska then US national defense has bigger problems than some quadcopters doing formation flying.
rwmj 6y ago
A major British airport was put out of action for days in Dec 2018 because of a drone or drones flying around. So yeah it'd be nice to find out who was flying these even if they didn't disrupt any airports or military installations this time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatwick_Airport_drone_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatwick_Airport_drone_incident
- googlryas 6y ago
  There isn't even evidence there ever was a drone(that wasn't controlled by the police). > The lead investigator from Sussex Police questioned whether there had been a drone at all.[18][19] Giles York, Chief Constable, later said police thought that original sightings were of an unauthorised drone, but it was possible that later sightings may have been of a drone used by Sussex Police

mlthoughts2018 6y ago

It don’t see why you’re puzzled. It sure sounds very concerning to me. It was concerning enough to many people that they reported it, including law enforcement personnel. Given this, it makes complete sense someone might choose to investigate.

jagged-chisel 6y ago
You didn’t explain the concern. Starting an investigation while the activity is on-going in an attempt to ascertain potential threats: fine. Continuing an investigation for unfounded “concern” and curiosity’s sake after the activity stops and there was no crime committed: wasteful.
- wastedhours 6y ago
  Because whomever was flying the drones might do it again. If they can ascertain who it was and what they were doing, they'll be able to rule out any malicious future intent to their actions. I'm not sure anybody really wants a number of unidentified flying objects (in their literal sense) in the air at night with noone knowing where they came from or what they might be doing. I don't consider that "unfounded" concern, think it's quite valid on the spectrum of concerns actually. Seems like a reasonable use of resources to get to the bottom of it (albeit, perhaps not their full-time work). Not every investigation will succeed, and the outcomes can often be that nothing can be done. You can only get to that by doing the work though.
  - tfigment 6y ago
    If no law was being broken then investigation sounds like harassment to me. While it could be annoying there are a lot of thing that are annoying that are no illegal. I'd love to take away the power tools from my neighbor but they are not doing anything wrong and should not be subject to official inquiry just in case they could be.
    - wastedhours 6y ago
      Agree with that, however this is a case with very little precedent - there needed to be an investigation to get to the conclusion nothing was wrong as it obviously did concern a lot of people. For me, that's part of the role of these bodies, ensure that something that looks sketchy actually (or potentially in this case) isn't. It's unchartered territory for people to have random flying things buzzing over the skies at night (and feel it's an entirely valid thing to be concerned about), whereas an annoying neighbour with some tools is well established.
      - UncleEntity 6y ago
        > Agree with that, however this is a case with very little precedent - there needed to be an investigation to get to the conclusion nothing was wrong as it obviously did concern a lot of people. Anything that isn't specifically illegal is legal by default. They determined no illegal activities were conducted by flying a fleet of drones in a low-population rural area so...
        wastedhours 6y ago
        > They determined no illegal activities were conducted by flying a fleet of drones in a low-population rural area so... And they determined that by investigating (which is what we're discussing here). I'm not arguing about it's legality, just that they determined its legality by investigating something reported by genuinely concerned people.
  - 14 6y ago
    I have to disagree. You sound like the person in the video linked in one comment. She called the drones creepy. Why are they creepy? You don’t say creepy but you call them “unidentified flying objects” the article clearly states they are drones. We just don’t know who flew them and that bothers you. Also you think it is a good use of public resources to drive around and identify people not committing crimes flying drones after the fact. Why do you fear drones so much? I mean if they were flying into your yard hovering by a window I could see being upset but some guy flying drones in formation way in the sky and people freak out, why? It could be as simple as a drone enthusiast taking it to the next level. As I type this I feel my tone will come across as negative but I honestly hope you can bring some discussion to my questions. I have only ever played with cheap drones my kids own. Awesome fun. But slowly the drone world is being chipped away with more regulation some good but some implemented by people out of fear. If you are in my area and you see a drone in the sky it’s just me having fun and probably if you watch long enough I will put it in a tree. I don’t want the police searching around and bothering me especially after it was confirmed by the FAA that no crime was committed. Otherwise it sounds like harassment for something they don’t like.

oxymoran 6y ago

It’s not concerning, or even worth trying to solve the mystery, to you that we can’t identify a fleet of flying drones that are not from our military and that seem to be slightly more advanced than current consumer drones.(hovering silently for hours in high winds/storms). That’s just not worth your time? The drones could have been doing any number of nefarious things, but let’s not worry about it right? It could have been a foreign adversary for crying out loud.

na85 6y ago
First, who's "we"? Do you work in national defense? Second, how do you know they can't identify it, when there are several emails being withheld from the FOIA request? To me, that's a dead giveaway it's a CIA project or something. Third, if a foreign adversary has the capability to maliciously land and take off from rural airports in Nebraska then US national defense has bigger problems than some quadcopters doing formation flying.

rwmj 6y ago

A major British airport was put out of action for days in Dec 2018 because of a drone or drones flying around. So yeah it'd be nice to find out who was flying these even if they didn't disrupt any airports or military installations this time. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatwick_Airport_drone_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatwick_Airport_drone_incident

googlryas 6y ago
There isn't even evidence there ever was a drone(that wasn't controlled by the police). > The lead investigator from Sussex Police questioned whether there had been a drone at all.[18][19] Giles York, Chief Constable, later said police thought that original sightings were of an unauthorised drone, but it was possible that later sightings may have been of a drone used by Sussex Police