Two men suspected of flying a drone “dangerously close” to Boston’s Logan airport were arrested on Saturday night and charged with trespassing, according to authorities.
The arrest on one of the Boston Harbor islands comes as suspected drones continue to be spotted in airspace in New Jersey and Connecticut, alarming residents and setting off calls by some for federal detection equipment – and by others to shoot down the mysterious aerial swarms.
In a Saturday statement, the White House said some of the objects were drones – but confusion has continued to swirl.
The former Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger told CNN that, in his estimation, the mysterious craft were not drones or UFOs but regular aircraft.
“Every video I’ve seen, and I’ve spent the last couple of days looking at every one of these videos … are all airplanes,” said Kinzinger, a former lieutenant colonel in the US air national guard. “They’re literally all airplanes! Some of them will show an airplane that’s kind of stable out there and says that’s a drone and actually, it’s an airplane flying towards you at 30,000 feet.”
At a press call on Monday, Donald Trump accused Joe Biden and the Pentagon of a cover-up. “The government knows what is happening,” Trump said.
“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,” he said.
“I think they’d be better off saying what it is,” Trump added. “Our military knows and our president knows. And for some reason, they want to keep people in suspense.”
Trump declined to say if he had been briefed, but said: “I can’t imagine it’s the enemy, because if it was the enemy, they’d blast it out – even if they were late, they’d blast it.”
According to the Boston Globe, Robert Duffy, 42, and Jeremy Folcik, 32, were arrested by harbor patrol shortly before 10.30pm inside a decommissioned health campus. The officers who took them into custody reported investigating “a hazardous drone operation” near the airport.
A third suspect, who is believed to have fled the island on a small boat, is being sought, according to police.
Boston police said a drone was found inside Duffy’s backpack, and the two detained men were scheduled to be arraigned on Monday.
According to police, a Boston police officer using surveillance technology about six hours before the arrests detected an “unmanned aircraft system” operating near the airport.
They identified the drone’s location, altitude, flight history and the operators’ position on Long Island in Boston harbor.
“Even small drones pose significant risks, including the potential for catastrophic damage to airplanes and helicopters,” police said in a statement. “Near-collisions can cause pilots to veer off course, putting lives and property at risk.”
Pointing at how serious of a response authorities are now considering for the apparent mass drone sightings, Boston police co-ordinated their efforts with the Department of Homeland Security, Massachusetts state police, the joint terrorism taskforce, the federal communications commission, and Logan airport’s air traffic control.
Chuck Schumer, the US Senate majority leader, on Sunday added his name to a list of officials who were requesting federal-level drone detection technology.
Meanwhile, Mike Waltz – the Florida congressman who has been chosen as the national security adviser for the second Donald Trump presidency – said the drone sightings, particularly the unexplained ones, exposed gaps between federal agencies and local law enforcement.
“Americans are finding it hard to believe we can’t figure out where these are coming from,” he told CBS’s Face the Nation.