I live in an area that has the “speed monitored by aircraft” signs all over and I’ve lived here my whole life. I’ve never heard of anyone ever getting a ticket from one and I’ve always wondered if it was just a scare tactic or something.

36 comments

  3. I suspect Maryland, and no, it’s bs, I’ve driven down I95 doing over the limit with those signs around and have never gotten a ticket.

  4. They have those here in Virginia. Someone put another sign on it that said “Aircraft monitored by S.A.M.. (surface to air missile). Funny as hell.

  7. I’ve seen those in New Mexico, never seen an air craft tho, is imaging there is a monitor somewhere that alerts police to where to go

  9. They have these signs on route 80 in NJ, I’ve asked alot of people the same question and no one i know has gotten one.

    Years and years ago, I did see a helicopter flying right above the interstate though. He was booking it, so it might have been a medical chopper.

  10. I have never gotten a ticket for anything but my math teacher from high school did the one time and he was pissed lol 😂 he’s the only I know of that actually got a ticket from a “drone” or aircraft

  13. My uncle said it happened to him when he was younger in Ohio. He’s also “that” uncle so who knows tho

  14. Yep, in Oklahoma when I was in college. They pulled over me and 1 other car by radioing down to patrol cars parked on the highway up ahead.

  15. My understanding is that while the signs are still up, the police in Virginia realized the aircraft was too expensive to maintain, and have mostly if not completely abandoned the tactic. It never really was about actually photo radar though. It mainly involved police in the air radioing down to police in regular cars who to pull over and ticket.

  17. You wouldn’t necessarily know you got your ticket due to the aircraft.

    They use small airplanes to monitor sections of highway. When they spot a speeder they radio a patrol car on the ground its description.

    The officer on the ground will independently measure your speed when they get close enough, and pull you over.

    They don’t have to bring up the aircraft in court because it’s not relevant – the spotter isn’t using radar, they’re using fixed points along the highway and clocking how fast you get from one to the next. It’s not as accurate as the radar gun, human error is more of a factor. The officer on the ground just needs to say “I was driving behind and clocked the driver going ____mph with the radar gun.” They don’t need to say **why** they were driving up behind the speeder. It’s not really relevant. If you got clocked going 15 over the limit, you got clocked.

  19. The route I was just on has them (CA-128) but I don’t think the CHP actually flys anymore to do it. Typically they always had ground units working in tandem to actually give the tickets.

  20. Yep. SW Virginia. Got me at 80 in a 65 too so it became a reckless op and a $400 ticket

  21. So how it tends to work is the aircraft are in position over top a location with two markings

    The aircraft will time a vehicle passing the two markings, and then they will radio a unit on the ground

    At least that’s how the NH state police do it

  22. Ages ago in Missouri, the cop told my dad it was an airplane that caught him speeding on the interstate, which he totally was. He drove off after getting the ticket in total silence before finally saying to me and my sister with a look up at the sky “I don’t think it’s fair they use airplanes.” I had to try real hard to stop from laughing at that

  23. Yes. A combination of airplane and cop on foot. Around 2002 in Illinois. I had no idea they even did that around here.

  26. I wasn’t driving but, I was riding with my buddy when he got one in IA back in 2006 is so.
    Dude was very much the ” I know how to speed without getting a ticket” type and one day we’re going down some practically deserted road in Iowa doing like 75. We turn down a different road and there’s a cop standing I the road waving us over to the side. After we pull over, the cop explains that the airplane pegged us doing 70 in a 55.

  27. During the mid 90’s i got caught by one of those. The aircraft monitored the traffic and reported to state police below which vehicles to pull over. They had an entire highway slowed down, pointing at cars to pull over for tickets. I think they got six in my set alone. The officer who wrote me the ticket apologize after he realised i was an active duty Marine on leave, he was former Marine himself, and said he would have let me go if the aircraft hadn’t spotted us.

  28. In those areas you would notice marks on the road so the aircraft could time you between marks and know how fast you were going. It seems to have really fallen out of favor because even places I used to see it I never do any more.

  29. I’ve seen the signs but never heard of anyone getting a ticket that way

  30. Virginia has these signs at every state border since as long as I can remember. It’s all BS as far as I know.

  31. Yes. The aircraft actually swooped down and skynapped my car from the road. The co-pilot came out and gave me the ticket at 15,000 feet and I had to drive home from the airport.

    (/s)

    …No, I haven’t gotten a speeding ticket from an aircraft. But I have seen the signs.

  32. I’ve seen those signs in Virginia! Pretty sure it’s not a thing though, maybe the state decided to keep them as a relic

  33. I had this happen to me several years ago on the highway going into Stillwater, Oklahoma. I came over a hill and saw a police officer standing outside of his car, waving me to pull over. He told me that their “aircraft radar” caught me going like 72 in a 65 or something like that. He seemed surprised that I actually pulled off, thanked me for doing so, and let me off with a warning. It was super weird, I’ve never heard of it happening to anyone else. I didn’t actually see/look for the “aircraft”, but the road was super dead and I would always be on lookout driving that stretch of highway for speed traps, so I couldn’t really think of any other explanation.

  34. Related, in Nebraska and other states you would see white paint marked at intervals on the side of the highway. The airplane would time how long it took for a car to travel from one mark to another. This allowed them to calculate the average speed of the car.

  35. Yeah I was in a class with a girl once and she was doing 100 in the middle of nowhere and they got her with the airplane 🤷‍♀️

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