White flags fly from Brooklyn Bridge in stunning security breach

...the giant American flags at the top of both sides of the Brooklyn Bridge were replaced by white-painted flags overnight...

Emergency Services cops lowered the two rogue flags — which are the traditional symbol for “surrender” — and packed them up along with what appeared to be painting supplies...

Police are trying to figure out how someone was able to gain access to the bridge, which has patrol cars stationed on both sides and also has security cameras.

A representative from the Department of Transportation is on scene with a new set of American flags that will replace the damaged white flags...

White flags fly from Brooklyn Bridge in stunning security breach

This raises 2 big questions in my mind:

1. What meaning is intended by the white flags?

I'm guessing it's probably a symbolic political statement, but who is surrendering to who, even if only symbolically? Is the bridge surrendering? Or Brooklyn? New York? The country? The people?

2. If security is so tight, how is it no one noticed someone doing this?

Ever since 9/11, the Brooklyn Bridge has been considered a possible terrorist target. With police cars at both ends and security cameras supposedly monitoring everything 24/7, how did someone apparently climb up, take down two 'giant' flags, paint them white, and put them back up without anyone noticing?

This is probably not a huge news story, but I think it's an interesting one...

Yes i agree definitely interesting i think was done on purpose. Im not sure but i can not see just a reg.joe climbing up there under the surveillance they have in NY and on the bridge..Also the white flag means surrender in military so?

Gotham has a new mastermind better call the batman or
Probably the government giving the banks the go ahead for bankruptcy

I find it pretty stunning how they are not just white flags but either white American flags or bleached ones...I must say somebody was pretty creative to come up with that one. Certainly a powerful message indeed.

originally posted by: switchqm8
Yes i agree definitely interesting i think was done on purpose. Im not sure but i can not see just a reg.joe climbing up there under the surveillance they have in NY and on the bridge..Also the white flag means surrender in military so?

Of course it was done on purpose. Do you think a group of people or even a single person snuck into secure parts of the Brooklyn Bridge, took down the American flags, then replaced them with white flags could do this by accident?

I just posted this on the other thread:

Did a little digging and came up with a story about the flags on the moon being all white now. So, what if the video surveillance shows that nobody replaced them? The ones on the moon they say are white from UV Radiation....any chance this could be some freak radiation discoloring?

originally posted by: Vasa Croe

So it is likely that these symbols of American achievement have been rendered blank, bleached white by the UV radiation of unfiltered sunlight on the lunar surface. Some of them may even have begun to physically disintegrate under the intense flux.

Source

Here is what the color white represents in different areas of the world. It either means purity and peace, mourning and death, or surrender. I'm thinking of Palestinian conditions - what first came to mind.

Western: brides and weddings angels hospitals, doctors peace - the white dove purity and cleanliness

Eastern: death, mourning and funerals sadness

China: death and mourning virginity and purity humility age misfortune

India: unhappiness symbol of sorrow in death of family member traditionally the only color a widow is allowed to wear funerals peace and purity

Japan: White carnation symbolizes death

Thailand: white elephants are considered auspicious, white symbolizes purity in Buddhism

Korea: purity, innocence, morality, birth and death

Middle East: purity mourning

www.empower-yourself-with-color-psychology.com...

It seems unlikely it would be the deed of a gang (unless their color is white). It also seems unlikely to be a random act of vandalism, as it's definitely symbolic, with the purpose of sending a message. Hopefully it remains a mystery and nothing else comes of it. By the way, they need to secure their subways and trains in the city. These are fully insecure modes of transportation. I would be just as worried about those as the bridge.

Apparently a group called Bicycle Lobby is claiming responsibility......

A Twitter handle named @BicycleLobby claimed responsibility Tuesday, tweeting, "Earlier today we hoisted two white flags to signal our complete surrender of the Brooklyn Bridge bicycle path to pedestrians." The authenticity of the tweet could not be immediately verified.

Source

Link to the twitter feed.....

Twitter

Here is a video of police taking down one of the flags. It doesn't look like it would have been too easy to get to, but hard to say for sure.

a reply to: Vasa Croe

That's interesting about the lunar flags being bleached by UV, hadn't heard that. But it sounds like the Brooklyn Bridge flags were probably painted. They found "what appeared to be painting supplies," and some news stories cite people saying that the color change was sudden and they had not been fading.

a reply to: ikonoklast

TURK 182!!!!

Someone has to remember that movie.

originally posted by: Vasa Croe
Apparently a group called Bicycle Lobby is claiming responsibility......

A Twitter handle named @BicycleLobby claimed responsibility Tuesday, tweeting, "Earlier today we hoisted two white flags to signal our complete surrender of the Brooklyn Bridge bicycle path to pedestrians." The authenticity of the tweet could not be immediately verified.

Source

Link to the twitter feed.....

Twitter

I have to admit I would be disappointed if this was only about a bicycle lobby being upset about pedestrians on a bicycle path. But that Twitter account has posted more now, and pointed out that their Twitter account profile says it is a parody account.

So it doesn't look like the mystery is solved yet.

a reply to: ikonoklast

Other than a long walk up one of the side cables, it does not appear to be extremely difficult to get to the top of the towers.

Check out the following link from a news story in 2013.

Cops Talk Suicidal Man down from Brooklyn Bridge Tower

Bishop

a reply to: ikonoklast

Well, if they painted the American Flags white, that meaning would be that America has surrendered - and apparently, without a shot being fired.

This seems like something the street artist Banksy might do. Does anyone know if he is in the area right now?

20 years ago this would have been called something like a publicity stunt now its called a security breach..what times we live in.

originally posted by: For Truth
This seems like something the street artist Banksy might do. Does anyone know if he is in the area right now?

Banksy's to old and fat to be climbing up bridges lol

that twitter nonsense was dismissed as a joke and not the actual person who perpetrated the incident.

what's odd is they didn't just replace the flags with white ones. they actually said the flags were painted over with paint supplies. so someone would have had to have snuck those supplies up there along with themselves. maybe with the help of a little fog or low visibility it wasn't that hard of a feat. though someone would have to know exactly what direction the cameras were facing, how to maneuver up the bridge out of view of those cameras/patrols etc.

quite the night time feat. someone's not afraid of heights.... lol, that would scare the # out of me personally...

the obviously message is surrender. surrendering what? and to whom? if someone was to go that far to make a statement you'd think that they would go far enough so that their statement would be clear!

Really? A bicycle organization? I call BS on that explanation and tweet. First of all - they are not white flags. They are bleached American flags. That is a very clear message.

No way in hell some bicycle group did this to symbolize giving the bridge up to pedestrians. Me thinks a friend of the NYPD tweeted that out in order to take the heat off of them.

It has GOT to be more serious than that.

Wouldn't whoever did this be breaking some kind of law bleaching the flag??

Bicyclists....pfft. Nope. I am not buying what they're selling.


I would guess it is somebody simply symbolizing the decline on America. Perhaps the surrendering of the citizens to the power of the government. It is clear the people have no say anymore.

Maybe it is a protest against Obama not declaring war on Russia.
(which of course, constitutionally, is the job of Congress)

I was somewhere yesterday where they had a TV tuned to Fox News (a waiting room), and that was the sort of thing that was being editorialized (the president being a wimp, or some such).
I don't normally watch TV news and just use ATS for news.

The point being that someone might have not been content with just talk.