Equally baffling, their operators appear to have coordinated at least five to six drones simultaneously. Based on the pooled data available from the deck logs, we estimate the drones traversed at least 100 nautical miles in the July 14th incident.įurthermore, the drones were able to locate and catch a destroyer traveling at 16 knots in conditions with less than one nautical mile of visibility. Commercially available drones are not commonly capable of flying for such long durations across great distances with speeds in excess of 45 miles an hour. It is unclear why anyone would operate drones near Navy warships in such a brazen manner. Increasingly Pressing QuestionsĬumulatively, these new details raise a host of difficult questions. These later incidents are notable because they occurred during the investigation, and after FACSFAC San Diego had been closely consulted.Īt the time of writing, we do not have complete deck logs for the month of July except for USS Kidd, so it remains uncertain if other ships also continued to have drone encounters later in the month.įurther information continues to emerge from FOIA requests, but based on the available evidence it appears that the initial investigation did not ultimately identify the source of the drones. The approximate positions of each cluster of ships are numerically marked. The position of each ship at 10:00 PM is marked with a black indicator, and the track of the ship before and after the incident time is marked with colored dots. The following map shows maritime traffic around the ports of Los Angeles and San Diego on July 14th. Importantly, San Clemente Island is owned by the Navy and is frequently used for military training and testing purposes. The ORV Alguita, a 50-foot catamaran, briefly a subject of interest in the official investigation that would come, was just off the western tip of San Clemente Island. A Liberian-flagged oil tanker, the Sigma Triumph, was just south of the position of the three destroyers. The civilian bulk carrier Bass Strait, cited later in the investigation, was situated towards the northern edge of the encounter area. AIS is not strictly mandatory in all cases, and can be turned off, so it is possible other vessels could have been nearby, as well. That initial account described a tense encounter, culminating in the deployment of onboard intelligence teams.Īccording to AIS data, few civilian ships were in the immediate vicinity. Last year, documentary filmmaker Dave Beaty uncovered initial details about the events, centering on the Arleigh Burke class destroyer USS Kidd (DDG-100). The following is our own investigation into these events, during which we discovered these events were far more extensive in scale than previously understood.
The incidents received major attention, including from the Chief of Naval Operations-the apex of the Navy's chain of command. The ensuing investigation included elements of the Navy, Coast Guard, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The drones were described as flying for prolonged periods in low-visibility conditions, and performing brazen maneuvers over the Navy warships near a sensitive military training range less than 100 miles off Los Angeles. Navy simply refers to as ‘drones’ or 'UAVs,' pursued that service's vessels, prompting a high-level investigation.ĭuring the evening encounters, as many as six aircraft were reported swarming around the ships at once. Over a number of days, groups of unidentified aircraft, which the U.S.
#WARSHIP CRAFT DESTROYER SERIES#
In July of 2019, a truly bizarre series of events unfolded around California’s Channel Islands.