Dear Editor,
Any fans of 50s Science Fiction remember Ned “Scotty” Scott’s warning at the end of The Thing: “Watch the skies. Everywhere. Keep looking. Keep watching the skies…”
My family and I have been doing just that for many years, being fans of both the movie and astronomy. We enjoy watching the paths of the planets and occasional meteor shower from our backyard and network with others who do the same. Lately, however, we’ve noticed that the skies have become even busier than the days before the pandemic brought a halt to most air traffic and a lot of things seem to be zipping around our patch of sky.
Avid readers and followers of your site I’ve noted your many mentions of drone use by police and perhaps others in recent months and I’m wondering if there’s a correlation between what we’ve been seeing and the increase? in drone usage locally. Some appear to have standard running lights but others have no illumination at all.
Is it possible Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos are testing the latest models for their respective purposes?
And if they’re not of earthly origin, just remember what happened in The Thing. Scotty may have been right all along.
Sincerely,
Anita Hagermann & Friends/ Concord
Dear Anita:
Thank you for the letter. We’re fans of Science Fiction and Skywatching ourselves and we have LOTS of folks here who are, too.
While the technology is quite literally taking off and is in frequent use by the entities you mention you should know that there is an extensive drone testing program underway at Buchanan Field in your town which may account for some of your overflights. They operate within the mandate of the local airport but you may have spotted some of them zipping around our skies.
We had an interested reader send us some photos of their aircraft not too long ago, perhaps we’ll attach them here later.
Thanks for writing!
News24/680
Certainly have noticed an increase in air traffic of all kinds around the valley lately. Drone training facility? Oh, swell. Useful bit of info tho, so thanks for sharing.
You betcha.
Close Encounters (1977) comes to mind. As does Fox Mulder.
This might help. https://www.contracosta.ca.gov/7622/Drone-Operations