Anyone else notice an increase in military vehicles, planes and helicopters over the past week or two? I have seen Humvees on the streets in convoys, multiple Blackhawks flying in formation, F-15 flying real low patrolling the area, and today two Ospreys patrolling. Is this an increase due to the protests popping up across the nation?

 

What say you? Notice anything?

Where exactly are you talking about. Jersey, New York?

It seems the same to me down the shore by Sandy Hook.

I didn't notice anything this weekend. Drove past Dover AFB twice and didn't notice any sort of activity whatsoever.

I would attribute this to possibly an upcoming deployment, but that specific information would be classified (or should be). Last I heard, Dix is the last stop in the States for NG and Reserves (reason why you might see many odd looking unit patches in bunches). As for the aircraft, pilots need to maintain a certain amount of hours per month (or per whatever dependent on their SOP). Maybe again tied to a unit deploying in the near future, I would imagine this is why the pilots are out there.

There was a chopper unit where I was stationed, which was an ANG unit (no relations to my unit), and they would let Soldiers from my unit ride along when the pilots needed to pencil in hours. Awesome flights, as we would ride around Denver, the front range, and the Rockies in a Black Hawk free of charge for a few hours. Many people used it as an opportunity to take some really breath-taking photos for personal fun.

 

As for CRC (Crowd/Riot Control), there are specially trained units (ranging from Active Duty to NG to Reserves) across the country that need [public] authorization-- aka something you would hear before noticing. One thing I have heard of though is the influx of CRC training by many units, and not just MP/SP-type units. While this is attributed to possibly the rise in disasters (or the rise in need of military support in domestic natural disasters), people should also not forget that we are still involved in ongoing operations that, in many cases, involve more police action vs. direct contact. Hence, the training has more to do with the appropriate response to dealing with policing actions in countries that already are in pretty bad shape.

 

Don't worry, no need to don foil hats and peer for black helis.

 

Yet.

 

We used to participate in one full up stateside operation per year. Our convoys ran supplies(fuel) to aviation and armor units all over the U.S. as part of a Guard and Reserve readiness action.

 

Good training

 

Look up "Golden Cargo" and "Golden Coyote" to get a sense of it.

I don't know about on the ground, but I think I remember hearing about a change in commercial flight patterns. Maybe that changes where the military will fly on a daily basis too.

 

probably just a responce to people invading Lautenburgs Facebook page..you can never have enough self protection don't ya know..

 

 

Thats not the Army, it's the BATF delivering more weapons to the mexican drug lords. Nothing to worry about, they do it all the time.

It it was last week, it may have been end of fiscal year 11 use-up time

It it was last week, it may have been end of fiscal year 11 use-up time

It is sad but true. Can't have any left over money.

They are being brought in to crush the wall street protesters. Its ok to protest in other countries but we won't stand for it here. Mayor Mike doesn't want any trouble for his wall St buddies

It it was last week, it may have been end of fiscal year 11 use-up time

 

It's sickening to see how the military wastes money and material at the end of the fiscal year... they'd rather dump perfectly good ammo and fuel into the ocean than give it away to the taxpayers...

Anyone else notice an increase in military vehicles, planes and helicopters over the past week or two? I have seen Humvees on the streets in convoys, multiple Blackhawks flying in formation, F-15 flying real low patrolling the area, and today two Ospreys patrolling. Is this an increase due to the protests popping up across the nation?

 

What say you? Notice anything?

 

It would help to specify where you've seen these sighting, but there are multiple possible reasons. In South Jersey, in the Pinelands specifically there is usually a lot of activity due to JB MDL. There are a lot of ranges for air and ground units through out the area. There was also an event recently in the Sea Girt area involving the NJ ARNG and ANG. Gov Christie was at the event and there are a lot of headlines about it (More so trying to see if he was running for president). A link to the article is below.

 

Christie meets NJ guard

Well we had a governors review this weekend, They had 4 Blackhawks do a flyby, 3 f-16 fighter jets, 2 soldiers do a jump and 19 howitzers fired in sea girt. All of this for the Governor. mind you; the Blackhawks where hovering for about 45 minutes over the ocean waiting for Gov. Christie to show up. Everyone in formation was trying to calculate how much all that fuel cost and how many troops could be sent to WLC with that money. Really though: f-16 flybys?? and they flew to sea girt from atlantic city. $thousands in fuel and when we ask for good chow, where told there Isn't enough money in the budget.

I have been seeing an increase is military helicopters but Boeing is that far away.

Disaster response also. Ng gets out for this stuff also.

I haven't heard of any exercises going on but then again I wasn't around for the last couple of weeks. Either way you are sure to see an increased level of activity as JB MDL gets bigger and bigger.

 

As matty said, the fiscal year is ending and in order for units to receive their budget for the next year without it decreasing they have to use all of the current years budget, so there are increased flights and training and spending. It is the big flaw in the system.

 

'TheMan', don't bother thinking about how much money is spent for that type of thing. It will drive you crazy if you think about it too much. There are so many things that are so wasteful like that (the term fraud waste and abuse comes to mind), it is ridiculous, yet they implement all these little savings initiatives that are often unreasonable only to blow all that by having a jet burn circles in the sky for no real reason other then poor planning, laziness, and a lack of understanding because they (those in charge) don't listen.

I live near an armory and about 2 years ago, all of a sudden, they decided to build a huge fence around the whole place...replacing the concrete blocks that were a couple feet apart... I wondered "What are they preparing for?"

 

Then just last week, an area that used to be trees was cleared, about 40' wide and they made a path to one of the side entrances of the place..asked myself the same question..

This was all seen around Toms River area. I have seen the usual transport planes and the ocassional blackhawk or A-10. But multiple blackhawks flying in formation, along with Ospreys, and even a convoy of humvees just seemed a little much. This was over the past couple of days btw. Add to it, i just saw a story about the drill they had in Denver last week called Mountain Guardian. Look it up, it was a full scale drill including multiple agiencies involving a couple of "shooters" in a school and they had to transport the children to a football stadium. In my gut i feel like they are training for some kind of marshall law. My foil hat is securley in place now.

hey there Butcher.

 

You must remember that we are still deploying troops to the middle east. Training for that is still going on and is on-going as well as a being ready for large scale terror attacks.

 

That's just what the mlitary does. Keep in mind that if you were living in certain other parts of this country NOT seeing those drills would make you wonder.

they'd rather dump perfectly good ammo and fuel into the ocean than give it away to the taxpayers...

 

When did this happen?