Dozens of Unexplained Drones Have Buzzed America's Nuclear Plants Since 2024 (americanbuildout.com) 23
Slashdot reader ElectricVs shares this report from American Buildout, a new site covering "the intersection of data centers, energy and power, finance, and Main Street."
Dozens of unexplained drones flew over and near U.S. nuclear facilities between February 2024 and March 2026, according to records the Nuclear Regulatory Commission made public this week. In all, facility operators filed 67 reports of drones over or near 28 sites in 17 states. They include the Three Mile Island site near Middletown, Pennsylvania., where Constellation Energy plans to restart Unit 1 as the Crane Clean Energy Center. In one incident, about five drones flew roughly 100 feet above the [970-megawatt] reactor building at River Bend Station in Louisiana.
The story was first reported by the publication The Liberation Times. The NRC published the documents on its website in response to the publication's freedom of information request... Every entry carries the status "Closed Unresolved."
"Most of the incidents happened after dark," the article points out, "and none of the records identifies a drone operator. About half of the incidents, 33 of 67, occurred in an eight-week window between Dec. 3, 2024, and Jan. 24, 2025." (Virginia's Surry Power Station experienced five different incidents in December of 2024, including one involving "at least eight drones in two waves.") 100 miles west of Chicago, "drone activity" continued for more than two hours at the Byron Nuclear Station, where two separate drones were reported. In Waterford, Connecticut, "security observed four drones flying back and forth..."
The article notes a 2024 paper from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission citing a 2019 analysis that "concluded U.S. plants had no risk-significant vulnerabilities that adversaries could exploit with commercially available drones to cause radiological sabotage, or theft or diversion of special nuclear material."
The story was first reported by the publication The Liberation Times. The NRC published the documents on its website in response to the publication's freedom of information request... Every entry carries the status "Closed Unresolved."
"Most of the incidents happened after dark," the article points out, "and none of the records identifies a drone operator. About half of the incidents, 33 of 67, occurred in an eight-week window between Dec. 3, 2024, and Jan. 24, 2025." (Virginia's Surry Power Station experienced five different incidents in December of 2024, including one involving "at least eight drones in two waves.") 100 miles west of Chicago, "drone activity" continued for more than two hours at the Byron Nuclear Station, where two separate drones were reported. In Waterford, Connecticut, "security observed four drones flying back and forth..."
The article notes a 2024 paper from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission citing a 2019 analysis that "concluded U.S. plants had no risk-significant vulnerabilities that adversaries could exploit with commercially available drones to cause radiological sabotage, or theft or diversion of special nuclear material."
Wanna bet (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Wanna bet (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Look, times are tough right now. Everyone needs a side hustle.
Re: (Score:3)
It's quite possible; OTOH having drones flying over our nuclear plants isn't something we should feel blase about. Maybe a drone swarm can't do much actual damage to a nuclear plant, but the fact that people are flying drones (deliberately or accidentally) in a restricted area is bad news all by itself; it suggests either complete ignorance of the law, or bad intentions.
lax security (Score:3)
In a normal country, they would have gone after people for trespass.
Lame duck (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
This was during the "NJ Drone Flap".
Trump was on TV saying he'd been briefed on them and the drones were "tracked back to their garage".
Last thing he said about it before his FAA said "they were authorized, we're not explaining, stop asking".
Matthew Livelsberger said they were of Chinese origin.
Robert Hastings wrote an entire book on unidentified craft over nuclear facilities covering four decades of documented incursions.
The FoIA request sounds like good data but nothing new.
Trump is openly hoping for a terrorist attack (Score:4, Insightful)
Trump put completely incompetent people even by his standards in charge of anti-terrorism. One of them is literally a 20 year old grocery store employee. That's who's in charge of keeping you safe from terrorism at the federal level at least.
Iran isn't stupid so they didn't bite. Trump is of course doubling down because that's all right wingers know how to do. But Iran has pretty good control over their non state actors.
Bush Jr would never have gotten the second term without 9/11. Trump looks at that and says hey that could work for me. A couple thousand dead Americans isn't even a price to pay in his eyes.
Restricted air space? (Score:4, Insightful)
If the air space around these plants is restricted, then it should be defended. Shoot the things down, or triangulate the control signals and arrest the operators.
If it is not, then there is no story here.
Re: (Score:3)
It's been 12 years. It's a non-story.
Re: (Score:2)
Doh!
Slow news day indeed.
Radiological sabotage? (Score:2, Insightful)
Not necessary. Simply knocking the plants off line will suit the anti-nuke fanatics. And provide support for their "to expensive to operate" claims. And a lot cheaper to do than continually filing nuisance lawsuits.
Re:Radiological sabotage? (Score:5, Insightful)
No it’s people who own drones being curious and also stupid. There is no large conspiracy to sabotage anything. We sabotage our own infrastructure by lack of upkeep.
Re: (Score:2)
Two things:
Re: Radiological sabotage? (Score:2)
slashdot reduced to promulgating UFO slop (Score:2, Troll)
“Liberation Times [liberationtimes.com] is an independent news publication covering unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), government transparency, national security, intelligence, space and the scientific and political questions surrounding unexplained phenomena.”
Re: (Score:2)
But it was still the U.S. Federal Government that released new official records of their drones-at-nuclear-plant sightings. And American Buildout links directly to those records at NRC.gov [nrc.gov]. (The editor of American Buildout is a former editor at CMP publishing who also has experience with government work.)
Re: (Score:2)
Cue spooky music [youtube.com]
Been happening for 14 years... (Score:3)
Then it's nothing to be worried about. No way the government would of ignored that for 14 years. Sure, we could say the current admin might but Obama and Biden each had 4 years in that 14 years window.
So I'm sure the government knows and it's nothing to even bother reading about.
They are explained, just not to those who don't need to know.
Re: (Score:2)
Correct, it's been 12 years. Not 14. Doesn't change my post though. It's a non-issue that government knows about and isn't sharing.
Should not they be expected, by now? (Score:2)