Between 12 and 30 drones were spotted following a Coast Guard lifeboat off the Jersey Shore, a Republican lawmaker said during a Congressional hearing Tuesday on mysterious drone sightings in New Jersey. (Andrew Mills)
(Tribune News Service) — Between 12 and 30 drones were spotted following a Coast Guard lifeboat off the Jersey Shore Sunday night, a Republican lawmaker said during a Congressional hearing Tuesday on mysterious drone sightings over the last month.
A Coast Guard commander in Barnegat Light said during a briefing earlier this week that the drones were spotted following the 47-foot vessel, according to U.S. Rep. Chris Smith, R-4th Dist., who spoke during a joint House committee on possible security threats posed by drones.
Smith also said an Ocean County Sheriff’s officer saw 50 drones moving over land from the ocean at Island Beach State Park over the weekend.
“Maybe it’s China,” Smith told the committee. “Xi Jinping is a monster. Look at what Putin is doing. They’re all capable of doing horrible things to our people.”
The Coast Guard did not immediately respond to requests for additional information. The FBI also did not immediately respond to a request to comment.
The FBI is continuing to investigate thousands of nighttime drone sightings reported in New Jersey in recent weeks, though it is unclear how many of the reports were really unexplained drones and not airplanes or other objects in the night sky. The agency has asked for the public’s help in collecting video and photo evidence of sightings.
Gov. Phil Murphy and some local law enforcement officials have said the drones pose no known threat to the public. Other county and local officials have said the sightings, including some over the state’s largest reservoir, are “concerning.”
Ocean County Sheriff Michael G. Mastronardy told NJ Advance Media Wednesday he is “concerned” about the drone sightings. Asked if he considered them a public safety issue he said, “of course.”
“I’d like to identify who the people are, or have somebody identify them,” he said. “Ironically, no one has seen them land or take off yet.”
During the hearing, Smith asked for the military to use its authority to intercept a drone to investigate its origins.
“Just send that capability out to the ocean or to the beach, because they’re coming in every day. Figure out which one it is and bring it down and retrieve it and find out what is going on,” Smith said.
In a Tuesday letter to U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, Smith referred to “numerous instances of unmanned aerial systems (UAS) flying over New Jersey, including in close proximity to sensitive sites and critical infrastructure, to include military installations.”
Smith said Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey is able “to identify and take down unauthorized unmanned aerial systems and have utilized this capability to address overflights of the installation.”
Officials at the Department of Defense and Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst did not immediately respond to requests to comment. Smith’s office also did not immediately respond to a request to comment.
President Joe Biden has been briefed on the drone reports, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters on Tuesday.
“We are closely tracking the activity and coordinating closely with relevant agencies,” she said, referring to the FBI and Department of Homeland Security.
When asked about frustrations expressed by New Jersey officials and the public about the lack of answers about the sightings, Jean-Pierre said, “Obviously we hear them, and we understand that we are closely tracking this.”
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