The Ocean County Sheriff’s Department has deployed a mobile command center to Seaside Heights where it will center its drone investigation going forward, the agency announced Friday. (Note: If the video of the recent sightings does not load, please disable any ad blocking software in your browser.)
Law enforcement and elected officials will formally announce the establishment of the mobile command center at a press conference Saturday, but the vehicle – which carries numerous cameras, sensors and pieces of communications equipment – will be based at Hiering Avenue in Seaside Heights. The truck will be located in the gravel parking area off the beach.
Sheriff’s Department officials have been heavily engaged in the investigation of waves of suspicious drones, formally known as unmanned aerial systems, or UAS, in recent weeks. While the drone sightings began to be noticed last month near Picatinny Arsenal in Morris County, the Shore area has seen an exponential rise of UAS sightings over the past two weeks, including an encounter with a U.S. Coast Guard vessel.
The Ocean County Sheriff’s Department mobile command center, Seaside Heights, Dec. 13, 2024. (Credit: OCSD)
The Ocean County Sheriff’s Department mobile command center, Seaside Heights, Dec. 13, 2024. (Credit: OCSD)
“Our drone operators have been deployed throughout Ocean County fielding calls for service,” the department wrote on social media. “Additionally, we have set up video technology for the public safety. If you have concerns about suspicious activity, please report it to your local police department.”
In a video posted online Friday by noted outdoor journalist and television host Nick Honachefsky, UAS are seen off Ortley Beach, seemingly splitting into groups and moving in some type of pattern before moving away. One of the most comprehensive views of a drone sighting locally was captured over Barnegat Bay in Brick Township Thursday night, when a resident of the Shore Acres section zoomed in on a lighted airframe that resembled a “flying wing” configuration. Both of these sightings are included in the video embedded with this story.
“It was only about 300 yards up in the sky and made no noise!” wrote Honachefsky, whose journalistic pursuits have taken him across the world. “I couldn’t believe my eyes as it seemed big drones were spewing out smaller red blinking light drones offshore in my other videos. I do not know what they are but I know it’s not normal! Watch the ocean skies tonight and you’ll see.”
Federal officials have not disclosed what, if any, platforms have been deployed in response to the sightings, though aircraft observers have spotted numerous military airplanes that are unusual in the Shore area patrolling the skies, including a CH-53E Super Stallion heavy lift helicopter, operated by the U.S. Marine Corps, and a U.S. Army Beechcraft RC-12 Guardrail aircraft, which is used to collect signals intelligence from a standoff distance. The RC-12 is an especially rare sight locally, with its most prominent role in recent years being intelligence gathering near the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea. A U.S. Navy P-8 Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft was also spotted outbound from Maryland over the Atlantic Ocean on Thursday, after which its transponder disappeared from public tracking sites. A number of KC-46 refueling tankers were also seen off the New Jersey coast, though their presence is common given their basing at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst.
Officials were calling on the federal government to devote more resources to the drone mystery as sightings ramp up.
“The Biden administration continues to be dismissive of New Jersey residents who have witnessed these drones in swarms, including coming from the ocean, following a Coast Guard lifeboat, and flying over extremely sensitive military bases like Naval Weapons Station Earle in my congressional district,” said U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ). “Some press reports—including one from the Daily Mail—cite intelligence experts who suggest Russia could be responsible.”
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby generated controversy Thursday by claiming none of the sightings had been “corroborated.”
“We have no evidence at this time that the reported drone sightings pose a national security or a public safety threat, or have a foreign nexus,” Kirby said. “Using very sophisticated electronic detection technologies provided by federal authorities, we have not been able to – and neither have state or local law enforcement authorities – corroborate any of the reported visual sightings.”
“The American people and our trained local law enforcement officials have rightfully asked for real answers—not doublespeak from top Biden officials who still admit they do not know the origin or intent behind this unidentified drone activity,” Smith said in a statement.
