A super pink moon. The frequent drone sightings have fascinated and unsettled people across the state. Photo via @AccuAstronomy on Twitter
Chrissy Doremus knows people think she’s wrong.
Doremus, a brewery co-owner in Morris County, New Jersey, said she has seen three drones over her family’s home.
She’s one of thousands who have described seeing unmanned aircraft over neighborhoods, bodies of water or sensitive military bases in the state.
Federal authorities have said there is no known public threat, and many onlookers suggest sightings are often just misidentified airplanes, helicopters or stars.
“It sucks that there’s a lot of people out there now that are saying, ‘You guys are crazy,’ ” Doremus said.
“At this point, we know what planes look like. We know what helicopters are. And we’re seeing weird [stuff] out here.”
The frequent drone sightings have fascinated and unsettled people across the state.
Government investigators say there is no cause for concern, and President Joe Biden told reporters Tuesday that the activity does not appear to be nefarious. But residents say the objects’ presence is affecting daily life.
Carla Sousa, of Hunterdon County, lives about a 20-minute drive away from President-elect Donald Trump’s golf course in Bedminster, the site of repeated sightings. Trump said on Monday he canceled a trip to Bedminster because of drone concerns.
Sousa, 36, said she has been seeing flying objects in sky almost nightly.
“Every day, I am seeing more and more,” she said. “All different shapes and sizes. Some are silent, and some sound like helicopters. I saw one that looked like an aircraft.”
Sousa said she has enjoyed looking at the sky and learning about space since she was a kid, but has lately felt scared because of the mystery behind the reported drone sightings.
“It’s been super-scary,” she said. “My anxiety has been at an all-time high. I’ve been having restless nights, and I had a dream about it the other day.”
New Jersey State Police have been inundated with reports of drones since Nov. 18. Federal authorities said in a Saturday briefing to reporters that many are likely commercially available drones, and many others were misidentified planes flying much higher than hobbyists’ drones could hope to.
Residents have reported seeing drones arrive in clusters, some with green and red lights flashing, and hover over spots.
The mystery around the sightings has become fodder for online conspiracy theorists, whose viral claims are stoking further anxiety in the Garden State and nationally.
Elizabeth Warner, the director of the University of Maryland Astronomy Observatory, said it’s easy for people to get confused about observing objects in the sky.
“It’s very hard to measure the size of an object in the sky if there is nothing else in the sky to compare it to,” she said. “People should take what they see with a grain of salt. It’s hard to know if what you’re seeing is a smaller hobby drone or a larger drone, if it’s not next to a tree or house.”
Greg Eghigian, a history professor at Pennsylvania State University and author of the book “After the Flying Saucers Came: A Global History of the UFO Phenomenon,” said people are often drawn to focus on events that feel menacing.
“It’s not different from the phenomenon of ‘doomscrolling,’ where a lot of people can’t look away,” he said. “They keep going down these rabbit holes that make them nervous, and they kind of don’t know how to get out of it.”
Eghigian said social media interest in the drones is nudging people to keep looking up at the sky in hopes of adding to the conversation.
“Some people see it as their job to call politicians out,” he said. “Then there’s this larger group of people out there in the world who see this as something exciting to be part of. It’s an invitation for people to sort of say, ‘Maybe I’m the one to crack it,’ or, ‘I’ve got a perspective that nobody else is putting out there.’”
Christine Papale, of Camden County, said the drone frenzy has made her worried for her three sons - ages 13, 9 and 1.
“The fear of the unknown is getting to me,” she said. “There are so many speculations on what these drones are and why they are here, but we don’t know. I would rather just be lied to at this point, saying it’s nothing, than have to worry it’s something that could possibly harm us eventually.”
Papale, 36, said she’s never been anxious about drones before. She bought toy drones for her kids in the past, but she has never heard of the types of drones she sees social media speculation about.
“I really feel our government has to know,” she said. “It seems very fishy.”
To bring some lightness into the situation, Doremus, the Diamond Spring Brewing Company owner, and her husband released an amber ale called Drone’s Descent. She said neighbors are coming into their business to swap stories about the drones and the bizarre experience they’re all going through together.
“In the first few days, when people started saying ‘It’s not happening,’ then you get kind of that Jersey attitude,” Doremus said. “We know what we’re looking at. We’re not idiots. Yes, we understand that it could be X, Y or Z. However, we’ve seen some strange things. Like, don’t tell us that.”
The Washington Post