Unexplained Drones Spark Mystery In New Jersey Skies, Sending Social Media Into A Frenzy

It's like a page ripped right out of a sci-fi novel.

Confusion, fear, concern, conspiracy theories, and of course, jokes, are keeping social media users busy while the mystery unravels about the large drones soaring through the skies of New Jersey. And while this has been going on for a while now, it seems to only be picking up speed with reports of more areas with drone sightings and even reports of a drone crash Friday morning.

A quick search of "NJ Drones" or "Drone Sightings" on TikTok will bring you more videos than you can imagine.  While they are all showing different areas of NJ and the surrounding states, they all share one thing in common - the questions of who, what, and why!

In one video shared by TikToker Katie Caf, she shares what she saw while walking around a New Jersey track, calling them, "mysterious car sized drones."

When one person took to the comments to debunk her claim of them being drones saying, "Those are airplanes on approach to an airport," Katie replied, "No airport near here were an hour from Newark."

Many others claimed that what she was seeing were planes, but she explained, "Airplanes don’t go back and forth across the field + it was only 100 ft or so in the air as it flew across the field saw it without having to zoom in, maybe 3-4 ft wide."

The comment section quickly became a debate on whether it's UFOs, planes, or drones. But Katie's video is far from the only one on TikTok that shows mysterious objects flying around.

While many videos shared on social media are not super clear, it's obvious that there's something strange going on.

In a video shared by the page @starlingzain, an account that shares "strange disappearances and breaking news," you can clearly see a drone in the sky at dawn.

"Despite their size, they are very hard to record," the video shares. The video was taken on Thursday morning in Florham Park. The video continued by explaining that an "FBI official in charge of investigating the matter confirmed to the hearing that the agency still had no explanation for the sightings."

The FBI tip line has received thousands of calls about mysterious flying objects in the past few weeks.

"So many strange things going on it's a very scary time," one viewer wrote in the comments. Another said, "probably mass surveillance." One person in the comments shared that they've seen drones in Central PA and another said Georgia.

Manville, NJ resident Melissa La Rue said she's been seeing drones every night. She said her husband saw the first one earlier this year.

"My husband saw the fixed wing drones and smaller drones back in March 2024. He was told that it was for insurance purposes and that they were flying around to assess our property," she told The Blast. "It made no sense back then because insurance companies wouldn't be doing that at night. And personally, I thought he was crazy at the time."

She said that they've seen "multiple drones every night" and some of them are "larger ones that sound like helicopters."

With all the theories out there about the drones, La Rue said she feels the government is aware of what's going on and maybe they are searching for something. Regardless, La Rue, like many others, feel the government "knows something."

"The other theory that my family and I joke about are aliens," she said. "I mean, who in their right mind would think that we're the only life that exists in the entire universe."

So far, she's only seen the drones out at night.

With so many photos, videos, and theories online, and of course, AI, it's tough to get to the bottom of this mystery on social media.

"At the beginning, social media was great because we were all just trying to figure out what was going on," she said. "But now the group that I belong to is up to I want to say 42,000 people and so you have your conspiracy theorists, your alien people, airplane people, no one is nice anymore and who knows what pictures are doctored up with AI so we’re back to not knowing what the truth is really anywhere."

It's not only TikTok that has tons of proof that something strange is going on in NJ. Over on Facebook, there's a public group called, "New Jersey Mystery Drones - Let's Solve It," with more than 43,000 people on it.

Members have been sharing their photos, videos, thoughts, conspiracies, jokes, and news in the group.

One video recently shared had people debating whether or not it's a plane in the video.  Other posts shared have maps of where drones have been spotted, conspiracies about what's going on, and news information so people can keep in the know about the insanity.

TikToker Joey Contino shared breaking news this morning that it appears a drone has crashed overnight.

"Now investigations are underway to figure out where this drone is and what this drone is. According to the report, several people had said that they heard what looked to be or sounded like a drone crashing overnight in Hillsborough, New Jersey," he said. "This happened near some power lines, so people are assuming that said drone got too close, didn't see the power lines, hit it, toppled over before crashing into a wooded area located in the Hillsborough Promenade off of Route 206."

He continued by explaining that it's all alleged at this point and that there is no confirmation that it was a drone that crashed.

Another content creator shared some footage of the investigation that was happening in a parking lot, but one thing many noticed was no drone was seen. According to @treolovecoach, the FBI, SWAT, fire department, police, and HAZMAT were all on scene investigating.

"And poof it’s gone! Really!" one person wrote in the comments. When another person asked where the drone is, the content creator replied, "If there is one they kept us away. A firefighter said it was a Drone. Idk what to believe."

When asked about an update, the creator replied, "Patch says no Drone found. Local fireman said they aren't sure about that. IDK what to believe."

So the drone mystery lives on. Have you witnessed any of this craziness? Want to tell us about it? Email me.