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What is going on in the skies over Quincy?
By Dave on Thu, 05/09/2013 - 5:58pm
Mysterious aircraft puzzles Quincy residents
QUINCY —
The Federal Aviation Administration knows what’s up there but it’s not telling the public.
A slew of Quincy residents have been complaining and calling police and the city about an aircraft that appeared about two weeks ago and has been taking wide, repeated loops in the air, between about 7 p.m. and 4 a.m.
Residents from Wollaston to West Quincy describe a low-pitch humming sound coming from the aircraft. Some have said it’s reminiscent of a drone, which is an unmanned aircraft operated by remote control.
“It’s not a drone,” FAA spokesman Jim Peters said. “It’s an authorized flight and we are aware of it.”
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Comments
suggestions
Submit FOIA requests to the FAA and Quincy police. Police records, excepting active investigations, ARE public records, and the ONLY exception for blacking out info is for cases where a witness would be placed in immediate serious danger if their identity would be revealed.
Get someone with a big lens to take a bunch of photos of it or at the very least, someone with a pair of binoculars to get the tail number.
Look up the tail number online. There are several databases that cover tail numbers, including Airliners.net (where people take photos and then tag the tail numbers) and some FAA databases, too
Enlist the help of some HAM operators, or pilots in quincy who have handheld aircraft radios and know what frequencies to listen in on.
From that, you should be able to figure out what airport it is flying in and out of - and then you can simply go to that airport. It won't be hard to see where the plane 'lives', and who gets in+out of it. Have a chat with them when they're coming in or leaving the airport.
Patriot Ledger reader claims it's a Cessna C182
And reports a tail number. That N number belongs to a C182 owned by NRAI (one of the Big 4 registered agency companies - they're based in D.C.). Other readers confirm the report.
FlightAware claims that the last flight that plane made was from Corning, NY to Nashua, NH about two months ago.
Seems goofy that so many Quincyites (Quincarians, Qunitonians?) would be bothered by this and yet no one at the Ledger managed to get a telephoto shot of the thing to put to bed all the rumors of "unmanned drones".
Also disappointing that if the local authorities are aware of it (as the article claims) and say it's no threat, but it's raised enough hullabaloo to make the local news, that the powers-that-be can't be bothered to give even a minimal explanation. Just a "Move along, nothing to see here" type response. Feh.
From what I know, (and what I
From what I know, (and what I don't, but can assume), its one of those "you don't need to know" situations, and I'm sure we will all find out eventually, even though there will be no mention of the plane or the federal alphabet soup involved when we do.
But of course, they less they say, the more we all want to know.
It's a test flight
"and we're not telling you what it's testing, just in case the test fails and it crashes into your house (because we were testing the engines), invades your privacy (because we were testing super-strong spy cameras and mikes), or makes you sick (because we were testing super-secret anti-people rays.)"
What is going on in the skies over Quincy
Anyone have a video of this clearly annoying/mystifying airborne machine?
Out of curiosity, what could
Out of curiosity, what could be discovered by aerial surveillance that couldn't be figured out from some combination of aerial/satellite photos already available on Google and Bing and just driving around?
Speculation -
Tax mapping? Finding some outbuildings or additions on peoples' property that aren't assessed and didn't have building permits? You'd want something more up-to-date than Google, yeah - that's three or four years old. I wonder how much more complete that would be than driving around, though, and what difference in cost. Also, why would it need two weeks of photography?
Utter pipe-dream nonsense speculation -
A cooperative effort by all of the major cellular service providers to map their strength-of-signal coverage.
Beach Erosion
or river/creek bank erosian. This would be a perfect time to survey the Charles for how much has changed on the banks since the last mapping.
Why would it be a perfect time for that?
7pm to 4am? Kind of dark for that type of thing I would think.
Maybe its a night flying training plane for new pilots?
Okay, I didn't read
Okay, I didn't read carefully.
I thought it had said daytime flights.
Nighttime? Probably not tax mapping.
I'll change my wild speculation to "smoking the hull". They're using infrared or ultraviolet imaging equipment to look for leaks from sewer pipes or maybe even natural gas lines.
If you heard a pickup truck
If you heard a pickup truck driving through your town,would you have a 'right to know' who was driving it?
Kooks.
If it was circling my house nightly?
I'd find out or at least report suspicious behavior.
I heard this thing the other night.
Sounded like something out of Close Encounters.
I actually got up and looked into a nearby parking lot for a truck idling or a vacuum truck or hydraulics working.
At 3AM.
So, yeah, not kooks, but thanks for playing.
(No kookier then arguing on the internet for a hobby, at least.)
I saw this also while driving
I saw this also while driving through Quincy, it was weird that it was really low, the night i saw it, there was also a couple of other smaller planes flying near it, could be Drone testing
The most recent article/story
The most recent article/story I read/heard (sorry, I can't recall where) claimed that it's not an unmanned aircraft, but a small plane.
Thermal imaging?
Perhaps the plane is carrying thermal imaging equipment to look for indoor pot cultivation. No search warrant needed to do this, much like the City of Boston wanting electricity consumption data from landlords without search warrants.
My best guess was DEA plane,
My best guess was DEA plane, lookin' for hotspots for growhouses or something, but who knows.
Now in Brookline?
Sitting in the hot tub this afternoon watching the ball game, there was a single engine plane making regular loops over head. He was passing right over me in the Brookline Hills area, and heading north/east toward Brighton/Allston before reappearing from the Newton area. He must have done this a dozen times that I noticed. I admit, very curious (and unusual; I watch lots of planes from this spot) behavior.
Dabble in your favorite conspiracy theory...Now.