Saw a black chopper take off.....

This was really weird...just happened yesterday, about 5:10pm EST, St.Petersburg/Clearwater International Airport....which, incidentally, is also right against the Coast Guard base.... I'm not sure which one it took off from, but it was a matte black Blackhawk helicopter, no tail numbers, etc. and in broad daylight, during rush hour!

I could almost make out two symbols, on the starboard side of the fuselage (it was only about 150 feet or so up at the time, having just taken off)... Picture the chopper's right side, with the nose facing right. On the bottom left of the body, near the bottom, were two symbols. One (the left one) was a circle, about 12 inches high (couldn't see the details), and the other (to the right) was an orange or red triangle, with some red or orange symbol in it...(both were to the left of the door).

The real amazing part, is that it was EXTREMELY quiet....and this is from someone who's grown up around helicopters since a baby.... I didn't even HEAR it, I just SAW it!!!

I've heard that the black choppers may be part of a task force that searches for naturally growing narcotics... If so, it would make sense for it to liason with the Coast Guard, and maybe use it as a staging area, but it was pretty weird to actually see one so close, after witnessing them in this area (St. Pete, right across the bay from McDill AFB) so often....

*EDIT: Formed a topic out of this post in Weaponry.

[Edited on 1-16-2004 by insite]

Back to the topic. I suspect that this helicopter was indeed a federal drug related helicopter. What happens is that on US soil various drug smuggling rings are busted by the DEA and the FBI.

They gather information and can actually track ships leaving Jamaica with shipments of Cocaine, Heroine, Ecstasy and Marijuana/Hashish. Once the boats leave their home port they are greeted by a local fishing vessel and loaded out at sea. The fishing boat will use the coastline of estuaries and appear a native. But the DEA is usually onto the shipment before it ever leaves Jamaica.

Once it comes within US jurisdiction, Coast Guard are alerted to intercept the fishing vessel where the assets are seized and taken into federal custody. The motherships usually remain in international waters but on occasion they stray inland if the fishing vessel is having problems.

This is when they pull out the silent helicopters. They can intercept the boats while the transaction is in progress and avoid a possible dump of the evidence. They can afford to keep services like this in operation because of the huge resale value of the items on the street. Big money making scheme, like a governmental corporation and you are looking at their capital expenses in action.