2 Planes flying in same holdiing pattern above Las Vegas

I watch the skies all the time and notice everything around me. I woke up late this morning and there are two planes flying over the North/East part of the city above Nellis Air Force Base in a circle formation for hours now. They are bright white planes, brighter than any other planes I have seen, and because of their altitude they are much too big to be small private planes or private jets. I have done a search on the internet and can't find anything about it. In all the years looking up at the sky, I have never witnessed this before. Has anyone else noticed this before, or know how I can find out more information on it? They don't come up on any flight tracking sites either. Something is going on IMO for planes to be circling an air force base like this.

Thank you for posting this

I saw you post about this in the other thread and I was going to ask if you could take pictured but figured you would if you could. It turns out you were able to

I'm looking forward to the different explanations on this.

I see you have clear skies and you must have a couple hours of day light left.

Can you film a video if they're still there?

reply to post by Awoken4Ever


Planes circling an Air Force Base?!
No way!
Seriously though, that's what they do.

reply to post by Awoken4Ever

Something is going on IMO for planes to be circling an air force base like this.

It's an air force base......why would you not expect planes to be flying around it?

Why do you think that 2 planes are circling an air force base?

reply to post by GmoS719


Not sure how this is at all helpful to the thread, nor is it sharing any insight at all. I would assume you are not from Vegas and have nothing better to do but troll. They don't do that here, and this is a first. Thanks for your insight though.

________________________________

On another note, I am wondering if someone very important is in town, and it is just some kind of added protection. I went to 13news and there is nothing significant at all on the website, unless someone is in town cloaked. However, I haven't even seen this kind of formation before when the president was here so I would have to rule that one out.

reply to post by Argyll


Because in all the years here, I have never seen this before, not once. It is also in the flight zones of two local airports, which would make it even odder that they are flying in this airspace like this.

Maybe its training. When I got My pilots licence We had a procedure called touch and gos,

I have seen this before...several times.

I think it is routine. Like a patrol mission.

NAFB, The Nellis test range and area 51 are all connected by land.

But I don't know for sure.

Living in Las Vegas 20 years!

We need some people who were/are stationed there to explain.

reply to post by Awoken4Ever


I posted in the other thread, and it shows how to do the research to determine what they are:


Original post

Not sure if anyone has noticed it, but there are two very bright white planes flying around in a circle formation over the north/east part of the city, above the military base.

Could be any number of reasons, from some flight testing, to avionics to something else entirely. I'm checking Flight Aware now, but it's 1440 PST, and they don't show up. If they're below 18,000 feet, then they don't have to be on an IFR flight plan, they can be VFR and just talking to ATC (if they are in the Class B airspace).

Here, I looked at the info for Nellis, rather than McCarren Airport.

flightaware.com...

I see, today (7th December 2011) a NASA jet, as shown in the link above. It was local from Nellis today.

The WB-57 is the one seen some years ago over Houston, Texas that happened to make a lot of contrails that day, and caused all sorts of fuss amongst the "chemtrail" believers!! LOL.

NASA WB-57

reply to post by xuenchen


Interesting, ok thanks Xuenchen. Just because I haven't seen it, doesn't mean it hasn't happened before. That is the kind of answer I was after, someone that has been around for a while, and has actually seen it before. I just thought it was odd that I never saw it before, and of all days, today I notice it.

They are getting more visible now to the naked eye because the sun is setting in the opposite direction. They have been at it for at least 3 hours now that I have noticed. I still can't get better pictures though since I don't have a good camera.

Thanks

reply to post by ProudBird


Snap - and here's what the flight path looked like -

reply to post by Awoken4Ever

Because in all the years here, I have never seen this before, not once. It is also in the flight zones of two local airports, which would make it even odder that they are flying in this airspace like this.

Wow!

You have never seen 2 planes circling an air force base before

Is it not possible that they were training pilots?......or test flying planes?

reply to post by ProudBird


Yep...this plane, and the plane below it on the tracker, fit the bill for what I am looking at. The pictures of the plane here would also make sense as to the bright white color I am seeing. One shows that it took off at 11 am, the other at 9 am. Why would they circle like that for 5 hours...any clue? Is this standard military training or something?

Everything you put here though proudbird matches up to what I am seeing.

reply to post by Awoken4Ever

Why would they circle like that for 5 hours...any clue? Is this standard military training or something?

They are NASA research airplanes, some clues to what they do can be found online, but I will presume any that's associated with DoD might be classified on some levels.

reply to post by Argyll


I don't know what it is and hence the questions. Am I not allowed to question things to gain a better understand without someone being a smart ass that I just don't immediately accept the obvious answer?

If I didn't put it up, someone like Proudbird wouldn't of helped me find out more information, and then my mind can drift off into unnecessary thinking.

Is that alright with you or should I PM you next time I wanted to ask something for your permission ahead of time?

reply to post by ProudBird


Thanks proudbird. Want to know something funny...the area they are circling in is the heaviest area that we normally see the chemtrail/contrails in. You know where my crazy brain is going to wonder Thought you would get a kick out of that last sentence.

Thanks for your help, appreciate it.

Here's one research plane, voodoo1, which flew over Catalina island for about five hours.



And the resultant contrails:



So it does happen. Plenty of reasons, as noted above.

reply to post by Awoken4Ever

Is that alright with you or should I PM you next time I wanted to ask something for your permission ahead of time?

Not at all!

I merely posted my opinion on your initial OP.....I'm sorry if you were offended.

i seen them also from about 11:00 am till it got dark. Looked at them with binoculars think they were drones.

The planes were not really over the afb .and they looked out of place