Over the past few years, Reinforcement Learning has shown to have the capacity to train Deep Neural Networks to perform complex tasks. This paper investigates the use of a Deep Reinforcement Learning algorithm, Twin Delayed Deep Deterministic Policy Gradient, to learn a policy to fly a quadcopter through a First Person View(FPV) drone racing gate. BattleDrones is an autonomous drone racing competition held by Virginia Tech. Teams must design a controller to navigate a quadcopter through a course consisting of multiple gates as part of the competition. The quadcopter is outfitted with a camera that is used to identify an AprilTag [1], a fiducial marker, on the gates.

Gen. Pat Ryder answers questions on the uptick in drone sightings during a Pentagon press briefing. The Department of Defense (DoD) doubled down on Tuesday, saying the increasing number of possible drones being reported in places like New Jersey and New York are not U.S. military assets, adding that the vast majority of the unmanned aircraft are likely used by hobbyists for recreational purposes. Gen. Pat Ryder fielded numerous questions from reporters about the drones during a press briefing on Tuesday, but he remained clear that the drones are not DoD assets, nor are they part of any experimental programs. He said there are over a million drones registered in the U.S., and on any given day, there could be about 8,500 drones in flight. The vast majority of the drones, Ryder noted, are likely used by hobbyists or are for recreational purposes.

Rep. Dan Crenshaw, R-Texas, warned of the "real problem" Congress must tackle regarding drone security on Tuesday, following a House Intelligence Committee classified briefing on the mysterious sightings. "I think it's inaccurate for the Biden administration to say that they're absolutely sure that there's [sic] no problems here – they're not absolutely sure," Crenshaw told Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum on "The Story" Tuesday. "There's about 100 cases of these sightings that are still under under active investigation. Now, keep in mind, there was like 6,000 before a lot of them had been assessed to just be planes, manned aircraft, things like that… satellites. As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, Crenshaw emphasized that one of the "biggest problems" in addressing drone security is the lack of a clear "legal framework." A map depicts the various locations mystery drones have been spotted in Northeastern USA in December 2024. "Since 2017, 2018, we've given the federal government authority to detect and mitigate drone activity across the United States, but that tends to be pretty limited," said Crenshaw. "So DOJ has authority, DOD has authority, DOE - Department of Energy - has authority, DHS has some authority.

Mayor Michael Melham of Belleville, New Jersey, gives an update on the mysterious drone sightings across the Garden State on'The Faulkner Focus.' Lawmakers exiting a classified briefing with U.S. intelligence officials insisted they received assurances nothing "nefarious" is going on with the recent uptick in drone sightings in New Jersey. On Tuesday, U.S. officials from the CIA, FBI, Department of Homeland Security and Defense Department privately briefed members of the House Intelligence Committee in an effort to assuage growing fears over sightings of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) and fresh calls for federal action. "There's no evidence that anybody acted unlawfully here, or that any of these drones, in as much as the authorities know anything about them, are associated with anybody with malign intent," Rep. Jim Himes, D-Conn., ranking member of the committee, told reporters after the briefing. "I don't think we have any reason to believe that they are hiding information. And, again, we asked an extraordinarily detailed series of questions of 28 people over a period of three hours."

Official records show the army has been developing and testing'counterterrorism' drones in New Jersey for years, amid claims of a government cover-up. A 2018 defense contract awarded 50 million to a private robotics company to develop craft capable of creating 3D maps of urban areas for a'counter weapons of mass destruction' program. The contract was given out by the Army's Armament Research, Development, and Engineering Center (ARDEC), which is located at the Picatinny Arsenal in Rockaway, New Jersey, where mystery drones were first reported last month. Meanwhile, documents show the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an air restriction alert on November 21 prohibiting flights over the Picatinny base for'special security reasons' through December 26. The White House has claimed the drone sightings - which coincidentally began on November 18 - are not a foreign adversary, pose no threat and are not part of a US military operation.

The Department of Homeland Security issued warnings to state and local law enforcement agencies this summer regarding the "growing illicit use" of commercial drones, internal documents show. Among the recommended steps was to conduct "exercises to test and prepare response capabilities." A DHS memo from August, which has not been previously reported, paints US cities as woefully underprepared for the "rising" threat of weaponized drones. The capabilities of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) are "progressing faster" than available countermeasures offered under "federal prevention frameworks," the memo says, adding that it's common for state and local authorities to observe "nefarious" and "noncompliant" flights but still lack the authority to intervene. The memo states that violent extremists in the US are increasingly searching for ways to modify "off-the-shelf" drones to ferry dangerous payloads, including "explosives, conductive materials, and chemicals," with major advancements in the area being propelled largely by rampant experimentation on foreign battlefields, including those in Ukraine.

Joe Biden has finally delivered on one of his central 2020 campaign promises: he has united the country. Everyone – Republicans, Democrats, mayors, governors, average Joes – everyone is furious that the Biden White House is stonewalling us about the many drones swarming over New Jersey, New York and several other states. It is the perfect coda to the Biden presidency: a White House that is dishonest, scared and inept. John Kirby, White House spokesperson, has blithely parroted nonsense about people confusing what are quite evidently highly sophisticated surveillance machines with "manned aircraft" and "inaccurate sightings." "We have not been able to, and neither have state or local law enforcement authorities, corroborate any of the reported visual sightings" said Kirby in a recent briefing.

Suspicious drone sightings in states across the Northeast in recent weeks may be coming from inside the United States, according to a military expert. Civilians and lawmakers have reported drone sightings in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, Ohio and other states, with local and federal law enforcement offering little information about the aerial activity, most of which has been spotted at night. Some of the drones are as large as 6 feet in diameter, according to New Jersey state Rep. Dawn Fantasia, who was briefed on the matter last week. "The concern is definitely valid. One thing I do believe, I believe the government knows the source of these drones, and I believe the source of these drones is from inside the U.S., especially the larger drones," Col. William Dunn, president of Strategic Resilience Group, a government consulting group, told Fox News Digital.

An Iranian-American citizen and a Swiss Iranian have been arrested and charged by United States authorities with allegedly exporting sensitive technology to Iran that was used in a deadly drone attack on American forces based in Jordan. Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of Iran-backed fighters, was alleged to have carried out the drone attack that killed three US soldiers and wounded 47 others at a US military outpost in Jordan, near the Syrian border, in January. Federal prosecutors in Boston on Monday charged 38-year-old Mohammad Abedininajafabadi, who is known as Mohammad Abedini, the co-founder of an Iranian-based company, and Mahdi Sadeghi, 42, an employee of Massachusetts-based semiconductor manufacturer Analog Devices, with conspiring to violate US export laws. Abedini, a dual citizen of Switzerland and Iran, was arrested in Milan, Italy, at the request of the US government, which will seek his extradition. Sadeghi, an Iranian-born naturalised US citizen, who lives in Natick, Massachusetts, was also arrested.

Ocean County, New Jersey Sheriff Michael Mastronardy shares how he launched his own drones to learn more information about the mysterious drones hovering over his state on'Your World.' Government officials have responded to the recent drone sightings near an Air Force base in Ohio on Monday, noting that the incidents appear unrelated to the unusual sightings in the Northeast. The drones were seen near Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Greene County over the weekend. Following the sightings, the base closed its airspace for four hours on Saturday. According to its website, Wright-Patterson is "headquarters for a vast, worldwide logistics system, a world-class laboratory research function, and is the foremost acquisition and development center in the U.S. Air Force." In a statement to Fox News, Robert Purtiman, Chief of Public Affairs of the 88th Air Base Wing, confirmed that officials were aware of the drones.