The mysterious drones that caused alarm among many New Jersey residents last year were in large part authorized by the Federal Aviation Administration, the White House said Tuesday.
The large number of unexplained nighttime drone sightings in New Jersey and other East Coast states created a panic which at one point shut down an airport.
Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, now says many of those drones were authorized and known by the government.
"After research and study, the drones that were flying over New Jersey in large numbers were authorized to be flown by the FAA for research and various other reasons," Leavitt said at a briefing Tuesday.
Leavitt said that the issue grew worse "due to curiosity," as some of the drones also belonged to hobbyists and private citizens.
"This was not the enemy," she told reporters.
A wave of panic caused by the drones drew misinformation online, with Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J., suggesting on Fox News that the drones belonged to Iran. The Department of Defense categorically denied the suggestion.
In December, New York Stewart International Airport was forced to close its runways for roughly an hour due to drone activity in the airspace. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul requested federal assistance, saying the problem had "gone too far."
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy wrote to several federal politicians, including former President Joe Biden, urging them to take action at the national level.
Murphy wrote that he wanted to “encourage Congress to pass legislation empowering state and local law enforcement entities to use advanced detection and mitigation technologies to deal with UAS.”
Drones are often referred to as unmanned aerial systems (UAS) or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
John Kirby, who worked in the Biden administration's Defense Department, pressed Congress to pass legislation to "deal with that growing ecosystem of drones in U.S. airspace." He told NBC’s “TODAY” show last month that there was a gap in local, state and federal law on the matter.
"Our assessment leads us to conclude that these are lawful and legal aviation activities, manned and unmanned drones and civil aviation aircraft or commercial aircraft," Kirby said. “We know that there’s no national security threat."
