Posted on 08/04/2023 6:45:08 AM PDT by Red Badger
U.S. fighter jets are having worrisome aerial encounters in Arizona’s restricted air combat training areas, which fits with a broader trend.
Encounters with small unidentified "objects," sometimes in swarm-like groups of as many as eight. Sightings of other objects, including some characterized as drones, flying at altitudes up to 36,000 feet and as fast as Mach 0.75. Another apparent small drone actually hitting the canopy of an F-16 Viper causing damage. These incidents and many more, all occurred in or around various military air combat training ranges in Arizona since January 2020.
The events are described in reports from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) filed over roughly a three-year period. Overall, the data points to what are often categorized as drones, but many of which are actually unidentified objects, as well as what do appear to be drones, or uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), intruding into these restricted warning areas with alarming regularity.
Marc Cecotti, a contributor to The War Zone, has been able to obtain additional partially redacted reports about a number of these incidents from the U.S. Air Force's Safety Center via the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) that provide additional insights. Cecotti, together with Adam Kehoe, another one of our contributors, had first begun to notice a clustering of reports of unusual aerial encounters in southwestern Arizona back in 2021. An interactive online tool they created for The War Zone that leverages the FAA's public database of drone-related incident reports helped highlight that trend.
Arizona Is Host To Major Air Combat Training Areas When it comes to the Air Force, Arizona is home to Luke Air Force Base and Davis-Monthan Air Force Base. Luke has long been a major training hub for U.S. Air Force and foreign F-35 and F-16 pilots, though its work with the F-16 has been steadily diminishing in recent years. Davis-Monthan currently hosts units flying a variety of aircraft, including A-10 Warthog ground attack jets and EC-130H Compass Call electronic warfare planes, as well as the unit that oversees the U.S. military's famous boneyard that is part of the sprawling installation.
Units of the Arizona Air National Guard also operate from various bases in the southern end of the state. This includes Morris Air National Guard Base, which is collocated with Tucson International Airport in the city of the same name and that also hosts the Air National Guard-Air Force Reserve Command Test Center.
Marine Corps Air Station (MCAS) Yuma, a major test and training base for that service that hosts multiple F-35 squadrons, as well as units flying various other aircraft, is some 140 miles southwest of Luke.
Arizona has a number of major training ranges with restricted airspace, including significant areas adjacent to Luke AFB and MCAS Yuma. In fact, a large swathe of Arizona's border with Mexico sits under these ranges, including the Barry M. Goldwater range. There are a number of other designated Military Operating Areas (MOA), which can readily, if temporarily be closed off for training, elsewhere in the state. Restricted airspace and MOAs are all included in what the FAA more broadly refers to as Special Use Airspace (SUA).
The reports of unidentified objects, especially the ones involving groups of them flying together, are particularly interesting given the surge in interest in recent years in what are now often referred to as unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), but have previously been more commonly known as unidentified flying objects (UFO).
Members of Congress are increasingly pushing for more declassification and general transparency from the U.S. military and Intelligence Community on these matters. These calls from legislators have only grown in the wake of allegations of a massive coverup from intelligence official and Air Force veteran turned whistleblower David Grusch, which you can read more about here.
Beyond all that, Arizona is, of course, no stranger to reports of unusual drone activity and UAP sightings. In 2016, a Tucson Police helicopter had an encounter with a mysteriously capable drone in the skies over that city. Some five years later, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection helicopter was involved in an incident with a similarly puzzling UAS.
The War Zone was the first to report on the worrying appearance of drone swarms over the Palo Verde Nuclear Power Plant in Arizona across multiple nights in September 2019. There's also the matter of the crews of an American Airlines flight and a Phoenix Air charter business jet reporting encounters with what appeared to be the same UAP in the skies over the southern part of the state near the border with New Mexico the year before. The state is home to the notorious Phoenix Lights mass sighting in 1997, which remains a topic of discussion to this day, too.
Incidents in Arizona have, in turn, long highlighted the growing threats that UASs present, including outside of traditional battlefields. This is something The War Zone has been highlighting as a very real concern now and still evolving issue for years now, including in the context of UAP discussions and how problematic it is that the two issues are so closely intertwined.
It should be noted up front that not all of the reports about incidents in the skies over U.S. military training areas in Arizona during the 2020-2023 timeframe are necessarily notable, at least based on the information currently in hand. Some part of the uptick in overall incidents can be explained by the growing prevalence of consumer-grade drones, something that has appeared in other similar data sets in the past.
At the same time, a number of the incidents that the FAA and the Air Force documented in the past three years include details that are very attention-grabbing.
The Reports There have been a number of encounters between military aircraft and what are described as groups of craft flying together in the past three years or so in this specific part of the United States. For instance, on March 29, 2021, two pilots flying F-35s in the vicinity of Buckeye, Arizona, a suburb of Phoenix, made a report about "3 to 4 UAS off [the] right side while e[ast] bound at 17,000 feet," according to the FAA. On April 22, 2022, another F-35 pilot reported "8 silver UAS [at an altitude of] between 16,000 and 20,000 feet" in the vicinity of Glendale, Arizona, another Phoenix suburb, another entry in the FAA's logs says.
It should be noted up front that not all of the reports about incidents in the skies over U.S. military training areas in Arizona during the 2020-2023 timeframe are necessarily notable, at least based on the information currently in hand. Some part of the uptick in overall incidents can be explained by the growing prevalence of consumer-grade drones, something that has appeared in other similar data sets in the past.
At the same time, a number of the incidents that the FAA and the Air Force documented in the past three years include details that are very attention-grabbing.
The Reports There have been a number of encounters between military aircraft and what are described as groups of craft flying together in the past three years or so in this specific part of the United States. For instance, on March 29, 2021, two pilots flying F-35s in the vicinity of Buckeye, Arizona, a suburb of Phoenix, made a report about "3 to 4 UAS off [the] right side while e[ast] bound at 17,000 feet," according to the FAA. On April 22, 2022, another F-35 pilot reported "8 silver UAS [at an altitude of] between 16,000 and 20,000 feet" in the vicinity of Glendale, Arizona, another Phoenix suburb, another entry in the FAA's logs says.
******************************
MUCH MORE AT LINK........................
That's where the UAP I&IIBD Skinwalker 
©️™️®️ location (Intergalactic & Interstellar Intransit Beverage Depot Skinwalker ©️™️®️) is.
That 1.62ghz signal is the ToGo Order Line. When The Team starts sending up rockets and drones through the Triangle it increases the Pilots and Passengers extreme levels of stress having to evade them and the signal is turned ON. They turn it OFF when restocking the inventory.
Whoops ! (((PING))) to #61.
SHhhhh.... you will interrupt the sleep-walking that goes on here when you get away from the world political. No one here knows about Antartica or how we went to the moon in the 50’s or any of that. So don’t rock the boat.
Exacree.
Sorry - I got distracted before I could get through that sentence...
I think we’ve zipped past “soon” and our leaders are already bowing down to the Chinese overlords.
There he is!!!
Wasn’t he Ohio shipped onto the titanic, the Hindenburg, other spots?
Most probably 'air craft' - a generic term which includes an extremely broad spectrum from 'manned' and 'unmanned' to sub-sonic, super-sonic, hyper-sonic, and 'extra-terrestrial'... A nice way to include a safe 'UAP' (Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon) instead of 'UFO' which has come to mean 'extra-terrestrial'.
See number 55.
This is a good political site,perhaps the best, but when you go off the well known path it doesn’t work here.
_____________________________
I believe Freepers can walk and chew gum at the same time and I’m way too old and ornery to shrink from what I believe to be the truth. However, some are like my brother-in-law who told me - ETs are all BS to me until I can see one with my own eyes. Shifting the subject somewhat, I don’t know if anyone listens to the Shawn Ryan Show on YouTube. Being a retired Marine, I’m partial to my military brothers and sisters. I have a daughter who flew choppers for the Navy and a son-in-law who is a retired SEAL so the legitimate military is familiar home to me. Shawn is a retired Navy Seal/CIA agent and not afraid to go where the faint-hearted fail to tread. This interview has rough language because it involves two badass military guys shooting the sh_t over illegal beyond-black rogue ‘government’ operations. It’s what the late Senator Inohue warned us of years ago - https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4910144/user-clip-secret-shadowy-government
The Marine being interviewed had a close-up and personal meeting with the military arm of the beyond black rogue government. Pay particular attention to what was likely being smuggled here. Note how the local natural disaster taking place likely facilitated the smuggling activity - human (child?) trafficking. The rogue government funds its operations through all manner of smuggling activities - human trafficking, illegal immigration, drugs, weapons, etc. What really gets my blood boiling is how these SOBs have used our taxpayer-funded research and equipment to facilitate their smuggling operations.
Here’s’ Shawn Ryan’s interview with Marine Michael Herrara. Heads up - typical rough military language being used by participants.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zm4nh3S66I
*
Yes... I looked at 'Replies', which showed 'None' so I did not know that your question had been responded to. OTOH, my explanation is more explanatory, plus, while all the craft in question are not 'air craft', they are 'aerial phenomenon'... perhaps a subtlety.
Not sure where you got that. UFO, or unidentified flying object, means unidentified flying object. Calling something extra-terrestrial simply because it's unidentified doesn't work. To me there is zero correlation.
***Not sure where you got that. UFO, or unidentified flying object, means unidentified flying object***
You and I are not commercial airline pilots or Air Force officers. In the past if they make a report about a ‘UFO’ their careers are likely finished.
Once again, an object being unidentified does not somehow magically mean it’s from another world. That’s simply a knee jerk response by those who’ve have their own beliefs where facts don’t exist. Pure speculation. Not how I operate.☺
It's a bull shit term. Example; Could an, "Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon" possibly turn out to be extra terrestrial in origin? The obvious answer is yes.
In fact, I’m not sure what your position or argument is here...lol
I have stated the facts for years; you seem to take it personally. I am extremely sorry to have bothered you. Have a nice day.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.