Texas drone expert believes government is behind mystery flights
AUSTIN - Over the last several days, people across the United States have reported mysterious drone sightings.
Gene Robinson has operated drones for more than a decade and has flown missions for state and federal authorities.
He believes the initial flights were government operations, but he also said some of the latest cases may be copycats.
Robinson has no direct knowledge about who is behind the flights over New Jersey and other locations, but says the patterns look familiar.
"I think that there's probably a military contractor that could be testing equipment. Especially since most of the operations that are at night. And they are all well lit. So it's not like they're trying to really hide anything," Robinson said.
Robinson believes the flights could be an adaptation of swarm technology, which is used when clusters of drones are used for holiday light shows and sporting events.
"They're either testing swarm detection. Or they're going to be testing jamming, or some sort of counter drone. Something of that nature, but I think it's going to be the government," he said.
Some drones are equipped with special cameras and sensors, but Robinson doubts the flights are searching for a threat like a dirty bomb.
On Monday, President-elect Donald Trump spoke about the mystery drones.
He didn't say if he had a security briefing on them, but offered an explanation.
"The government knows what is happening. Look, our military knows where they took off from. If it's a garage, they can go right into that garage. They know where it came from and where it went, and for some reason they don't want to comment," President-elect Trump said.
Robinson agreed with what Trump said, and noted his own experience trying to develop an invisible drone.
"It's very difficult for me to believe that they can't identify what's in the air because I personally got to see some technology whereby they could detect where the drone came from and what it is being controlled by. This was ten years ago when this happened. So I would think that the advances that they have made so far are significantly better. And they should be able to tell us exactly what's in the air," he said.
Others have a bit of an "out of this world" explanation for the sightings.
"I'm not necessarily completely against the idea of aliens, but in my opinion, it would be pretty out there for it to be aliens," said Kyle resident Dakota Kittlesen.
The owner of a "spaceship looking" sports car that was parked at an office complex in Kyle laughed when FOX 7 asked about the space alien theory. Marty Capetillo decorated his Corvette for the holidays and said he believes the mystery flights are part of a government operation.
"I don't believe conspiracies and stuff like that. So, I think they just like to observe. I mean, I guess you technically have to observe people kind of see what's going on," said Capetillo.
In 2021, UT and the Army Futures Command tested a drone defense system in downtown Austin. The exercise simulated drone attacks on DKR Stadium and the Texas Capitol.
Earlier in December, the Department of Defense announced the signing of a new "classified" strategy to counter drones. According to a limited overview of the plan, it involves improving detection, tracking, intercepting/repelling and training.