The Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office has gotten 19 calls, calls about the mysterious drones flying across the states of Nebraska and Colorado since early December.

“Pretty much no one knows who is doing this,” Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department Operations Lieutenant Dan Newton said. Newton is in charge of the patrol division, so he is overseeing these sightings. “You could have local people flying their drones but there’s bigger drones that we don’t know anything about.”

The drones have caused some trouble around town. “My dad was turning off of the road that leads to the diesel yard…and almost hit a drone,” junior Isabella Whitney Said. 

Junior Elizabeth Winkler has seen these drones fly outside of her house in town. “I’ve seen groups of, like, four around my block,” she said. “I just think they are annoying.”

Anyone who purchases a drone needs to get it registered with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). However, these mysterious drones are not registered anywhere. “Some of these are 5 or 6 feet wide, which is bigger than the average drone,” Newton said.

Students have theories as to what these sightings could mean. “I think they are government drones…and I think they are doing tests, and they don’t want anyone to know about them; it’s creepy,” freshman Joseph Roeder said.

“We have gotten numerous calls,” Newton said. “Just call we would love to find them but we just don’t want anyone shooting at them.” Shooting at these drones is considered highly illegal. “We don’t want somebody mistaking a helicopter or small airplane for a drone and shooting at it.” 

There are precautions the deputies have to follow if one of these drones is found.

According to Newton, these drones are very high tech. “There’s going to be a tracking device on it so we need to be careful with what we say, what it sees, and what we do with it,” Newton said.