Helicopters in the sky

Ok, I live in northern New Jersey. I don't know what's going on with these things. I see them practically every monday night. There's 5 or so of them and it seems like they fly in a circular pattern. I see them around rt 80 from denville to clifton (a 20 mile stretch). I could swear they are following me. I go to my buddy's house in Clifton every monday. Now why would police helicopters patrol on a monday night when nothing is going on? I don't see them on weekends or any other time during the week. I see no reason for these guys to even be in the air. I live in Denville (a town full of old people) and yet helicopters patrol it? Either something crazy goes down every monday night, or our tax dollars as well as what's left of the world's oil is being completely wasted. Maybe someone who knows a little bit more about helicopter patrols and whatnot could fill me in, cuz it doesn't make any sense to me.

do they use water bombers for fires there ?

could be that, although maybe not in that area.

Nah, we don't really get too many forest fires around here. Clifton is about 20 minutes from nyc so it's a lot more city like.

Suggestion: Take a picture of them while flying in formation.

Do you know anything about military aviation? Do you know what a UH-60 Blackhawk looks like? Are these helicopters Blackhawks?

If you could take a picture of them, myself and many others here could tell you whether they were military or not, and what type of formation they are flying in.

Here's my guess: There's probably near you or near this area a National Guard or Army Reserve aviation unit that is preparing to deploy to Afghanistan or Iraq, and they are just training.

They have to train for things like flight and chalk contingencies, bump plans, basically prepare for anything and everything that could and might go wrong. They also are probably stress-testing their equipment to work out any mechanical issues they may have prior to deployment.

In other words, don't worry about it. Nothing to see here.

That's interesting and very possible. I couldn't really tell what they looked like because it's night, but they did seem to fly pretty fast. They had blue and red lights, but they don't really fly in a formation. They are spread far apart, and it seems like each one fly in one circular section ranging a few miles or so. If i look I will see at least one in every direction as I'm driving on route 80. Each time, a few minutes after I get home one flies directly over my house, almost like clockwork. Pretty wierd. If i could guess i'd say they're standard police helicopters. i'll take a closer look next week. The nearest military base is in fort dix, nj which is pretty far south from route 80 (about 90 miles).

[edit on 26-4-2005 by Barcs]

Any pot plantation in this area??? It might also be some regular Air Force exercises. They do make copter surveillance exercises in urban, or suburban areas... and sometimes it's not for exercise but for real undercover surveillance. I lived near a militaqry base for some time and they used to to a lot of these chopper exercises in the districts nearby.

Actually now that you mention it, I've heard rumors that there is a weed plantation 20 minutes from me. Not sure of it's exact location. I wish i could find out.