Investigation launched after pilot spots 'drone' near JFK airport

A commercial airline pilot said he spotted a black drone near the approach of the JFK airport runway.
The Alitalia pilot spotted the unmanned craft — described as “a black drone” — hovering just 200 feet from his jet about three miles east of the airport as he made his approach from Brooklyn.

“He was very clear as to what he saw,” a source said.

The pilot told investigators the object was flying at about 1,800 feet and looked like “a black drone about a meter square, with helicopter rotors on the corners.”

The Joint Terror Task Force is now probing the sighting of the mysterious flying object, the sources said.

I don't know if anyone posted this but thought it was newsworthy.

Read more: www.foxnews.com...

This is going to become much worse. Surely Air traffic controller see the drones on their screens. One day there will be a mid-air collision, and the public backlash will be too much to keep these drones in the air

Drones?
What drones?

I have been told repeatedly by numerous members here that the drones don't exist....

It is just a figment of that pilot's imagination.

Talking about drones......

www.abovetopsecret.com...

We'll see them so often that soon nobody will report them anymore, welcome to the new "normal".

They won't show up on Radar when they are that small. Radar has speed filters and most are set at 35mph. This black drone sounds like one of the toy "drones" that can be controlled with an Ipad.

There are a ton of these little toys out there, some mounted with cameras, some not. Now if I was a smart terrorist (oxymoron) I would buy myself some fancy little remote control toys and fly them into the intakes of commercial jets while they are on approach.

Although I am guessing that is easier said then done.

Originally posted by Mamatus
They won't show up on Radar when they are that small. Radar has speed filters and most are set at 35mph. This black drone sounds like one of the toy "drones" that can be controlled with an Ipad.

There are a ton of these little toys out there, some mounted with cameras, some not. Now if I was a smart terrorist (oxymoron) I would buy myself some fancy little remote control toys and fly them into the intakes of commercial jets while they are on approach.

Although I am guessing that is easier said then done.

Well, it must have been fairly large, he said it was about a meter across so it was a little over 3 foot across and I don't think a toy would reach the altitude a commercial aircraft would be at on approach.
Also, as a former large aircraft pilot (B52) when on approach stuff goes by the aircraft fast, and he seems to suggest it was hovering near and 'checking' him out.
I am wondering if it was larger than he thought?
Also, a slow moving drone (as he described as having twin helicopter blades) could have radar adsorbing covering. I personally saw some that looked like thin, black sponge-rubber that was (unofficially) placed over an automobile that did not show up on a ground radar.
Just sayin'

MIRRORED BY: CBSNewsOnline
The FAA is investigating a report of a drone flying near JFK airport in New York City. The unmanned aircraft came within 200 feet of an Alitalia plane. This video contains the control tower audio from the incident.

I don`t know why this would surprise anyone, if the U.S. has drones you can be sure that other countries have them too including countries who aren`t friendly with the U.S.

A chinese "fishing" boat could park off the U.S. coast in international waters and launch drones into U.S. airspace.

Originally posted by Mamatus
They won't show up on Radar when they are that small. Radar has speed filters and most are set at 35mph. This black drone sounds like one of the toy "drones" that can be controlled with an Ipad.

There are a ton of these little toys out there, some mounted with cameras, some not. Now if I was a smart terrorist (oxymoron) I would buy myself some fancy little remote control toys and fly them into the intakes of commercial jets while they are on approach.

Although I am guessing that is easier said then done.

I would guess no more difficult than flying a jetliner into the WTC at full speed with scant training.

reply to post by wulff


Doesn't matter. A quadrotor (which this was) is mostly plastic. Plastic doesn't reflect radar well, unless it's much larger. The whole thing is that while people are screaming about how this is the future, with the police planning to use them, these kits are available for less than $100 and take a few minutes to build. You can attach a camera to them or not It's the perfect device for someone that doesn't care about safety of flight, to try to get some great pictures of aircraft as they're landing.

From the description it sounds like it was a quadcopter and from the reported altitude of 1500 ft it was not an out of the box unit for certain from what I know of these things which is that I have been looking into this tech for a long while now. I get industry updates because the tech is interesting and has huge potential for making money, and having fun, as well as being great weapons and surveillance platforms. 1500 ft altitude was not a cheap system. I would bet on it being used for making movies. Just a guess but that is my opinion. They can investigate and perhaps someone will come forward saying they did not know they were violating the airspace of the airfield.

Okay let's say he did see a drone.

Could it have been a prototype of perhaps a training op?

Or can they not even do that in the US?

Imagine drones over your town or city 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, spying on the population. or worse still, dropping bombs sporadically without warning.Killing indiscriminately!



Can you imagine what that level of stress, that level of fear would do in the long term to families, to parents and their young, innocent , vulnerable,precious children?


The use of drones as a weapon is evil.It's as simple as that.

naw... couldn't be...

it was a weather balloon!

sorry.... couldn't resist...

Seriously... I hope that they find out what it was... esp. if it's a serious threat.

Originally posted by MisterMiyagi
Can you imagine what that level of stress, that level of fear would do in the long term to families, to parents and their young, innocent , vulnerable,precious children?

People would eventually forget they are there or even start to think it was normal and feel insecure without them.
Its only a select few like us that would not like them in my opinion.
And as children grow up with them the children would likely see them as normal and not care.
Drones everywhere is going to happen whether we like it or not i think.

oops wrong thread... Mods please delete this post. Thank you.