The "drone panic" of 2024 easily claims the title of the most absurd astronomy and physics-related story of the year. At its core, 99.99% of this so-called crisis boils down to people mistaking planes for something extraordinary. The rest? It's people glancing up at the night sky, seeing stars, and failing to grasp the staggering distances that separate us from them. Remarkably, this edges out another perennial misunderstanding: those who genuinely believe that changing the clocks is the reason for shorter winter days, rather than the natural shift in sunlight reaching the northern hemisphere during the season.

If these misconceptions came from children or college students, it might be understandable—even forgivable. But when they come from those who should know better—government officials, self-proclaimed aviation experts, and other supposed authorities—it becomes downright maddening. To make matters worse, even when irrefutable evidence is presented disproving the drone theory, many people stubbornly refuse to accept it.

Part of the problem may lay in the data visualization done by fight tracking apps. These apps give the impression that they are streaming the “real time assassination coordinates”, as Elon Musk put it, of a jet. When they are in fact time delayed by a not insignificant amount . To see an example of how bad data visualization can have major consequences.  Take a look at this video by Fatima Abdurrahman.

Much like the issues described in the video these apps should make it a lot more clear that they are not showing real time information.   Perhaps showing planes in motion not as a single point but a fuzzy region where they probably are.   This might make them feel less useful but it would inform people of the true state of the data the are looking at.   (Real aviation grade ADS-B in/out that pilots have access too might not have these same issues but I wonder...)

This hysteria could cause casualties. I’m very afraid someone will take a shot at one of those “drones” and hit a commercial or private plane in exactly the wrong place.

To illustrate just how misguided this hysteria has become, let me present two tweets as evidence—because, let's face it, tweets seem to resonate as authoritative sources these days.

The first comes from Steven Greenstreet who took a heat map of drone sightings from the Sheriff of Monmouth County, New Jersey. A quick glance reveals that these "sightings" align almost perfectly with normal air traffic patterns of regular, everyday planes.

https://x.com/MiddleOfMayhem/status/1867370892696990149


The second is an example of mistaken identity on a cosmic scale. With all due respect to the governor of Maryland, the "drones" he reported were, in fact, stars. According to Matthew Cappucci they are specifically, the constellation Orion—those points of light he's worried about are located between 244 and 1,344 light-years away.

https://x.com/MatthewCappucci/status/1867795051558084788

They’re not drones, not a threat, and definitely not moving closer. The stars will be in roughly the same place tomorrow, just as they’ve been for millions of years. Harmless and, one might add, awe-inspiring. This is a well known problem in the UFO community. People will regularly confuse Venus, or a star that they aren’t used to seeing or another planet for being a UFO.

Despite this clear and simple evidence, the panic persists and has spread. It’s a testament to how far we’ve strayed from even the most basic understanding of the world around us. Planes become drones, stars become threats, and facts are dismissed as mere inconveniences. Perhaps, instead of fearing the sky, we should start looking at it with curiosity—and maybe even a little humility.