Choppers at 6am?

[rebcamuse.livejournal.com]

From what I can tell, there are at least 3, covering from Union Sq. to Davis.  Anyone know what's happening?

Comments

[leko.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I just logged on here hoping someone knew. They're quite low.

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

one was over my house in south medford and it just left at 6:30.

I hope I'm not walking into a manhunt on my way to the square...

[mamajoan.livejournal.com]

I just logged on to ask the same thing. They woke me up at 6:15 and I'm still cranky. I hope they caught a serial murderer or some such thing.

[enochs-fable.livejournal.com]

wouldn't they have sent out a robo-call if something like that were going on?

[rmd.livejournal.com]

maybe it's massport, making sure we're desensitized to plain old airplane noise?

[ruthling.livejournal.com]

I live in Medford, we're not that organized.

[srakkt.livejournal.com]

Anyone see the helicopters themselves? At quarter-to-seven, I was out and about on the bicycle and didn't see or hear anything.

[leko.livejournal.com]

The one I could see, which was quite low, was just plain gray.

[srakkt.livejournal.com]

How many rotors? Any markings? Was it flying alone or as a member of a pair (I know you could only see the one, so you may not have been able to tell)? Anything stick out in your mind as a potentially identifying characteristic?

[an-art-worker.livejournal.com]

huh... reading the headline I initially pictured 3 motorcycles.


Maybe Obama has tapped Capuano for VP and they sending an envoy to tell him.

[ron_newman]

On Universal Hub, someone mentions a house fire, but gives no details.

[ron_newman]

Whereas I first thought of SCUL.

[mderidder.livejournal.com]

Hey all, big fire at 159 Central St.

This is a halfway house that frequently has ambulances and police showing up at all hours. No surprise that it went up.

The firemen I talked to didn't speculate on a cause.

They were all cleaned up by 7:30

[leko.livejournal.com]

1 rotor, no markings. It seems kinda small. It didn't look like a news chopper, since they all have plenty of markings, but I looked to see if it had a camera, and it looked like there was something on the bottom of it at the front, but didn't look large enough to be one of those cameras in the big weather-proof cases.

[srakkt.livejournal.com]

the camera gizmo was probably a FLIR sensor. If it was the halfway house up in flames, they'd use FLIR to find people and ignition points inside the building as part of the firefighting operation.

That also narrows down what sort of bird it was - probably a Bell 212 (or a UH-1N, the military variant. All grey usually means military)

[mamajoan.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's right near me. No wonder the dang things were so loud. And I noticed nothing out of the ordinary on Central when I drove up it at 8:30.

Nothing on the Somerville Journal or Somerville News websites about this....

[mamajoan.livejournal.com]

I definitely saw two. I threw on my bathrobe and went outside expecting to yell at someone for mowing their lawn too early in the morning. ;)

I didn't have my glasses on, so I couldn't tell you anything about the helicopters except that there were two of them and they were, uh, you know, flying. Around. In the sky. Hey, I just woke up, gimme a break. ;)

heard it at Medford and Glenwood

[dirtyknees.livejournal.com]

I pretty much figured it was a fire, since I could also hear engines running, and a noise that must have been fire hoses. I hope no-one was hurt.

Sigh. And my neighbors(?) got into a huge screaming/fist fight right next door at 4AM.

Sleep is for the weak.

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

they'd use FLIR to find people and ignition points inside the building as part of the firefighting operation.

Okay, that's just freakin' cool.

I especially LessThanThree military technology being used for peace-related life-saving!

Mystery helicopters

[rebcamuse.livejournal.com]

I saw two...one over Medford, and the other closer to Union Sq. and thought I heard a third. They were pretty close to the ground, circling, one had an actual searchlight going (I think). Not military from what I could tell.

The Capuano/VP comment was hilarious.

[rebcamuse.livejournal.com]

Dar. Half these comments never made it to my email. Glad to have figured it out.

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

They were probably State Police copters. I'm not sure how many other agencies, other than some of the news media, have helicopters around here.

Could these have been them? MSP uses Eurocopters, in a blue/gray/white color scheme:
http://www.mass.gov/?pageID=eopsterminal&L=4&L0=Home&L1=Homeland+Security+%26+Emergency+Response&L2=Response&L3=Emergency+Tactical+%26+Response+Teams&sid=Eeops&b=terminalcontent&f=msp_units_msp_airwing&csid=Eeops

They fly over Boston periodically to escort natural gas tankers to the dock. Its possible they were in the area for that reason, and were requested to check out the fire scene.

Another, less likely, guess is that it had something to do with an "active shooter" drill that Boston University was running around 8 this morning.

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Well there's other possibilities. Scroll up ( or click the link if the identify-the-chopper thread folds up ) to see if any of these pics ring a bell.

http://community.livejournal.com/davis_square/1405315.html?thread=15508611#t15508611

[makoshark.livejournal.com]

Apparently a day late (I was fast asleep at 6:00AM), I just logged and thought this was about the motorcycles which have been loudly revving their engines around Davis this evening.

But I guess you're not talking about either SCUL or it's motorized equivalents.

[zmgmeister.livejournal.com]

Something linking to our thread popped up on the Journal's blog in the middle of the day.

[rebcamuse.livejournal.com]

Quite honestly, at six in the morning, sans contact lenses, and out my bedroom window, I was pretty pleased I could even tell they were helicopters, period. Interesting, though.

Thanks everyone! It is great to know we can have an on-line community to keep track of stuff like this.

[ron_newman]

Somerville Journal article says it was at 155 Central.

2nd time this week. But now at 3 am!

[rebcamuse.livejournal.com]

I can't see it, but I can hear it. Near Prospect Hill and loud enough to wake me up. This is getting irritating.

Re: 2nd time this week. But now at 3 am!

[rebcamuse.livejournal.com]

5:52 and they are still going. If these are news helicopters...