Please advise: Could be something, could be nothing.

One of those occurences where you think "this doesn't look right":

I was on the way to work about two weeks ago in a light rain when I noticed something that seemed out of place. Four brand-new Dodge Durangos of the same model with tinted windows and no license plates were heading northbound on I-95 south of Wilmington Delaware. I say new because they had that sheen from polishing, no markings whatsoever and those thin red lines on the tires when you get them new. Three were black followed by a silver one in the back. I was particularly facinated so I varied my speed to find the tags either in the front or back. Though the windows were tinted it was tranlucent and I saw no tags in the rear window as sometimes happens when people lose their plates.

Do dealerships normally transport trucks this way? I thought they did it by semi or had T-tags.

Why else would they be new and tagless staying so close in line at the same speed?

FWIW, whenI had my new car delivered from one dealership to the one I purchased it from the salesman had put the dealership magnetic license plate on it. That's here in Va. it could be different in other states.

Interesting none the less...

Could be a special secret service task force, no tags helps keep the idendity of the vehicle a secret. Such as rogue police insiders giving registration information to criminals in an effort to track down CIA or secret service personel.

With no tags there is no way to do this except taking the vin, which I am sure is altered or covered, requiring someone to actually break into the vechicle to obtain the vin.

But could just be a dealer transfer. This seem low on the probablity scale though as it was a multiple convoy of the same color and model which is out of the normal for a simple dealer transfer.

usually when transporting cars, dealers use regular state license plates with "dealer" on it, or those paper temporary tags.

intriguing, but most likely it could be very innocent

did you notice the drivers? were they military type or just your average joe?

What about a test on some new equipment package or new model? By any chance are you familiar enough with cars to have recongized any differences between the vehicles you saw and this year's model?

Every once in a while I see "convoys" of civilian cars that seem a little too uniform. I've never seen them without tags before though. Usually it's been tests on fuel cell or other alternative vehicles, and they are normally marked to indicate as much.

On the other hand, back when Chrysler developed the gas turbine engine they took a couple of those things cross country under pretty stiff secrecy, and a few years later they gave away trial vehicles to be tested by consumers. If there's something revolutionary about the vehicle it may be acceptable to cover them up in that way- maybe somebody around here knows more about R and D protocol.

Probally a military convoy to a base?

Here at my base we do have durangos, they are called posting vehicles, its what we use to go from base to our post, and then the people we relieve drive the posting vehicle back to base after they give us our field vehicle. However, these vehicles have a white front and rear plate that say Government vehicle, so I'm pretty sure they aren't military, at least not day to day normal operations.

Originally posted by saint4God
One of those occurences where you think "this doesn't look right":

Do dealerships normally transport trucks this way? I thought they did it by semi or had T-tags.

Why else would they be new and tagless staying so close in line at the same speed?

GM in Janesville will normally place one tag on one of the trucks not all of them that are in transit. Pickups around here are not normally transported by a semi, they travel in a convoys.

perhaps that is the case where you are not sure though.

Originally posted by worldwatcher
usually when transporting cars, dealers use regular state license plates with "dealer" on it, or those paper temporary tags.

intriguing, but most likely it could be very innocent

did you notice the drivers? were they military type or just your average joe?

I couldn't tell with the tinted windows. It looked like one driver per vehicle by the silhouettes. No hats. They kept a short following distance. Though that's not unusual for a sunny day, given the conditions it looked curious. No waivering like tired commuters or lane changes like the impatient ones. Very professional if not impressive.

[edit on 4-12-2004 by saint4God]

Delaware.. I would say that's close enough to the governmental area of the USA for it to be considered something.. top secret or government related.... I'm only thinking one thing right now... weird.


Ice

Vehicles for undercover law enforcement use? I know this sounds REALLY extreme, but you dont want a trail of any kind for a vehicle you plan on using for really sensitive law enforcement operations. Suppose that you get into a fender bender on the way to wherever you're going. Now if anyone runs the vehicle history of the undercover law enforcement officer they find that it was being driven by some other person recently and had an accident. They run a backgrond check on that person and it turns up to be a cop. Now your undercover dude is gonna get shot.

I know how unlikely it seems, but never underestimate bureaucratic over-thinking of minute details.

Just a dealer transfer. Secret Service or whoever on a mission would have regular vehicles, so as not to draw attention to themselves.

weird but I wouldn't really worry about it unless you start seeing them more often then Id get suspicious. It just doesn't make logical sense if it were a big time military thing, they wouldn't be making a spectical of themselves... If it were a high up military job you wouldn't have noticed anything out of the ordinary... It is their job to be invisible most of the time.

I was driving through Arizona mountains once and happened upon the same sort of scene.

There were 4 or 5 cars w/nothing on them. All black, no emblems, no plates, tinted windows. They were going the same direction I was going, so we kept trying to get close to see what/who they were. Each time we would get close enough to pass one, it would speed up and simply would not allow it. They finally all sped up and I lost them.

Finally, about 15 miles down the road I saw a couple of the cars pulled into a 'hole in the wall' diner/road stop. I pulled into the place, and tried to walk by one of the cars on my way into the little store. One of the drivers 'pops' out of the store, as if to say "get away from the car"!

The owner of the store rang up my soda, and of course I whispered to him, "what's all that about"?

He told me it's a normal scene in that area. Car companies bring their 'proto-models' out to the desert to test drive and run them hard. He said the manufactures remove all emblems even tint windows to keep others (like me!) from know what type or brand of vehicle it is. They want to keep the "secrets" away from competitors eyes!

Sounds like what you witnessed. You probably just witnessed the models coming out in 2007!

I doubt it's undercover law enforcement since they were new vehicle. A few bullet holes would seriously diminish their value.

Government? Perhaps. The area is full of activity from Philly, D.C. and Baltimore.

The theory I like most is...

Originally posted by SourGrapes
I was driving through Arizona mountains once and happened upon the same sort of scene.

There were 4 or 5 cars w/nothing on them. All black, no emblems, no plates, tinted windows. They were going the same direction I was going, so we kept trying to get close to see what/who they were. Each time we would get close enough to pass one, it would speed up and simply would not allow it. They finally all sped up and I lost them.

Finally, about 15 miles down the road I saw a couple of the cars pulled into a 'hole in the wall' diner/road stop. I pulled into the place, and tried to walk by one of the cars on my way into the little store. One of the drivers 'pops' out of the store, as if to say "get away from the car"!

The owner of the store rang up my soda, and of course I whispered to him, "what's all that about"?

He told me it's a normal scene in that area. Car companies bring their 'proto-models' out to the desert to test drive and run them hard. He said the manufactures remove all emblems even tint windows to keep others (like me!) from know what type or brand of vehicle it is. They want to keep the "secrets" away from competitors eyes!

Sounds like what you witnessed. You probably just witnessed the models coming out in 2007!

That sounds more like it! When I thought there was something different initially, I think it may have been the design. Dodge does have an assembly plant in Newark, only a few miles from I-95. I'd say they cranked out a few puppies to see how they would ride before introducing to the market. They drove like professionals, reinforcing the thought. Leave it to businesspersons to try to keep it hush hush because of competition. I know the company I work for has done some goofy things for testing. How about that? Never made the connections until now. Thanks for the help!

Not ruling out something odd, but this seems to fit the profile.

[edit on 5-12-2004 by saint4God]