Exclusive: Drone Videos Sent to Coast Guard During 2024 New Jersey Wave Go Public
Written by Kyle Warfel and Christopher Sharp - 12 November 2025
Video footage submitted to the U.S. Coast Guard during the height of the New Jersey drone incursions in December 2024 — and referenced in documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act — has been obtained by Liberation Times.
Four videos, filmed by a witness in Sea Bright, New Jersey, on the evening of 17 December 2024, show multiple flashing lights in the sky and a brightly illuminated object on the surface of the ocean. The shoreline and sea are clearly visible throughout the footage, as the witness shines a green laser towards one of the objects.
The videos can be seen by clicking the links below:
The witness who provided the footage also submitted a written statement in an accompanying report, which read:
“Witnessed large number of drones travelling from sea. Possibly launched from ship and return. Ship is about 3 miles out [from] Sea Bright NJ. Drones are as large as F-150 truck.”
The witness reported observing more than 50 drones over a 20–30 minute period, describing audible rotor noise and unusual flight behaviour. The objects, they said, did not transit briefly like aircraft, but instead loitered, moving back and forth between offshore and inland positions—behaviour they believed suggested a maritime launch point.
The report was one of multiple sightings recorded in December 2024, when drones were observed over Island Beach State Park in New Jersey.
Logs and incident reports relating to those sightings were obtained by Liberation Times through a Freedom of Information Act request.
Marik Von Rennenkampff, a former analyst at the U.S. Department of State and Obama administration appointee at the Department of Defense (now Department of War), reviewed the footage and provided his assessment to Liberation Times:
“After reviewing the metadata from the mobile phone videos and identifying the observer’s location, the flashing lights observed off the coast of New Jersey not only match FAA strobes but also ABS-B transponder data for commercial flights that operated in the congested New York/New Jersey airspace that evening.
He added:
“Once again, just as with the overwhelming majority of footage from last year’s ‘drone’ incursions over New Jersey, this is yet another case of misidentified civilian aircraft.”
An assessment provided on 10 December 2024 by the Department of Homeland Security’s Transportation Security Administration showed that witnesses were in a ‘high-traffic patter[n] for JFK International Airport.’
The assessment continued:
‘At the time of observation, these aircraft were descending out of 20,000 feet down to 10,000 feet until intersecting the glide slope into JFK. Due to their altitude, these aircraft would likely not be expected to have their approach lights on, as they are typically activated at, or below, 10,000 feet. This means that only the green or red wingtip lights would be visible, along with multiple strobes on each wingtip, on the underbody of the fuselage, on the top of the vertical stabilizer, and on the rear of the fuselage by the APU exhaust.
‘Were these videos to be of UAS operating over the ocean, we would expect to see these 17 aircraft to be visible in the background with their high-intensity navigational lights described above activated. Since we do not see additional aircraft beyond the drones, it furthers the assessment that the reported UAS in these videos are the aircraft themselves.’
Although commercial aircraft lights are absent from the footage, the behaviour described by the witness—objects moving inland, returning offshore, hovering in place, and producing rotor noise—does not correspond with commercial aviation activity.
Drone activity in New Jersey also extended to Naval Weapons Station Earle, a high-security U.S. Navy munitions base with waterfront facilities located along Sandy Hook Bay, just minutes from Sea Bright.
The facility — which features one of the longest naval ordnance piers in the world and plays a critical role in loading and transferring military explosives for Atlantic Fleet operations — confirmed multiple unauthorised drone incursions in December 2024.
Above: Map showing Sea Bright and Sandy Hook Bay, where Naval Weapons Station Earle’s waterfront facility is located. Map data © Google
In January 2025, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt downplayed reports of mystery drones, including those observed near sensitive military installations in New Jersey, claiming they were simply research drones approved by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
This was despite the FAA having imposed restrictions in direct response to these incidents.
Drone incursions from unknown actors across the Western world have continued into 2025, with Belgium among the most recent countries forced to respond.
Consistent features of the incursions include uncertainty over the point of origin and operator control, alongside indications that electronic countermeasures — including jamming systems — have proven ineffective.
