JLENS blimp breaks free of tether on East Coast, now floating over Pennsylvania

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The runaway JLENS blimp is seen listing over rural Pennsylvania near the town of Millville. (Holly Starr/Special to the Baltimore Sun) (Holly Reffeor / Special to the Baltimore Sun)

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An unmanned Army surveillance blimp which broke loose from its ground tether in Maryland floats through the air about 1,000 feet about the ground while dragging a several thousand foot tether line just south of Millville, Pa.

(Jimmy May / Associated Press)

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An unmanned Army surveillance blimp floats through the air while dragging a tether line just south of Millville, Pa., Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2015. The bulbous, 240-foot helium-filled blimp came down near Muncy, a small town about 80 miles north of Harrisburg. The North American Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado said the blimp detached from its station at the military’s Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.

(Jimmy May / Associated Press)

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An unmanned Army surveillance blimp floats through the air while dragging a tether line south of Millville, Pa.

(Jimmy May / Associated Press)

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An unmanned Army surveillance blimp floats through the air while dragging a tether line west of Jerseytown, Pa.

(Jimmy May / Associated Press)

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An unmanned Army surveillance blimp floats through the air while dragging a tether line just south of Millville, Pa., Wednesday, Oct. 28, 2015. The bulbous, 240-foot helium-filled blimp came down near Muncy, a small town about 80 miles north of Harrisburg.

(Jimmy May / Associated Press)

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An untethered Army surveillance blimp flies over Bloomsburg, Pa.

(Susan Switzer / Associated Press)

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In this February 4, 2015 file photo, an aerostat is seen from its mobile mooring station as it is deployed at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland.

(BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI / AFP/Getty Images)

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A JLENS blimp floating above Maryland.

(Lloyd Fox / Baltimore Sun)

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Two JLENS blimps in view from Baltimore.

(Lloyd Fox / Baltimore Sun)

By Matthew Hay Brown

Baltimore Sun

Oct. 28, 2015 11:01 AM PT

The Baltimore Sun

One of the two JLENS blimps that has been surveilling the East Coast from Maryland has broken free of its mooring and is now drifting over Pennsylvania, authorities said.

Two F-16 fighter jets from an Air National Guard base in Atlantic City, N.J., are monitoring the unmanned aircraft, and the North American Aeropsace Defense Command is working with the Federal Aviation Administration “to ensure air traffic safety,” a spokesman said. The blimp was drifting at an altitude of 16,000 feet.

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The 243-foot-long, helium-filled blimp detached from its mooring at the Edgewood Area of Aberdeen Proving Grounad at about 11:54 a.m., a spokeswoman for the Army installation said. It was trailing approximately 6,700 feet of cable.

NORAD spokesman Michael Kucharek said the command was working with other agencies “to address the safe recovery of the aerostat.”

Authorities warned anyone who sees the blimp to keep a safe distance and dial 911.

matthew.brown@baltsun.com

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Matthew Hay Brown

As Senior Editor for Investigations and Enterprise, Matt leads The Sun’s investigations team, works with reporters throughout the newsroom on enterprise, and plans and edits the Sunday newspaper. As Senior Editor for National News, he assigns, manages and edits coverage of Washington, national security and the federal workforce. Matt has worked as a Washington correspondent covering Congress, the White House and national security, and as a foreign correspondent covering the Caribbean and Latin America. He has reported in English and Spanish from Iraq, Syria, Cuba, Haiti, Russia, China, Japan, South Africa and many other countries. As a staff writer at The Hartford Courant, he was a member of the team that won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize in Breaking News Reporting. Matt earned a master’s degree with honors at the Graduate School of Journalism at Columbia University, and teaches journalism at the University of Maryland and the Catholic University of America.

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