Buho

Wicky, I think you nailed it with that Twitter report of an engine failure. Now I'm questioning my sanity. I could have sworn I saw six prop engines.

I was practically under the flight path, and it was landing a few miles away, so quite low. The perceptual size of aircraft was about half the size of my hand stretched out in front of me -- quite easy to see -- and I tracked it for about 10 seconds from overhead to disappearing behind the treeline. I counted five semi-transparent discs of the rotating propellers and one stopped one with four blades. The discs were in front of the wing (tractor, not pusher). I wasn't counting jet engines or fuel tanks. And yes, as you found, there are other people out there who are seeing something similar. Discounting my anecdotal evidence doesn't help anybody. Thanks for the explanation. The only thing I can figure is FlightRadar24 data is wrong. I played the February 11 afternoon reply out longer and didn't find any other candidate that matched the flightpath I saw. The pics of the Pakastani bird don't match what I saw, which was solid matte gray, no markings. Thanks for your help, all. Maybe someone else will get their phone out fast enough to snap it.

I definitely saw six prop engines (semi-transparent discs in front of five engines, one portside engine was off showing four blades). I wonder if it's possible that the plane callsign was spoofed for civilians, hiding a more covert operation. That's all I got, guys. This is the best thread on the Internet for the mysterious six-prop aircraft everyone's seeing around the country. I hope y'all solve the mystery. EDIT: The shape of the aircraft I saw doesn't really match a Hercules C-130 anyway. It was about 40% longer, more tubular, with a seemingly symmetrical cone in front for a nose, and the wings were longer to accommodate a 3rd engine on each wing. (All dimension comparisons assuming the diameter of the body is the same as the C-130; I don't know how objectively big it really was as it flew by in the sky.)

Sgt.Squarehead, so what do you make of the two URLs I posted? Maybe I'm reading the page wrong? (I'm not really an airplane aficionado.) Something flew over and FlightRadar page correlated that. I searched for the registration number 4153 and found this: https://www.c-130.net/aircraft-database/C-130/airframe-profile/7066/ which does list 4153 as Pakastani. But the pics there definitely have four engines, not six. Maybe the info on FlightRadar is wrong? Is it possible to spoof the flight tracker serial? The plane is currently in Pakistan now, two days later, which is odd. I definitely saw six prop engines.

I saw a six-propeller military aircraft fly over central Maryland this afternoon at 20:32 UTC. I used Flightradar24.com and I'm pretty sure what I saw was, according to Flightradar24.com, the PAAF206 Pakistan Air Force en route from Portugal to Fort Meade. The website (https://www.flightradar24.com/2021-02-11/20:37/12x/PAAF206/26cc9423) shows a path that matches exactly what I saw, banking to land at Fort Meade (a few miles from where I was.) It's listed as a Lockheed C130 (Hercules). Six clear engines, one engine was not running and I counted four blades on it. I couldn't hear it since my neighbor was snowblowing. I don't know how accurate Flightradar24.com is. The body seemed longer to me, like a simple cylinder with a crude cone in front, and the wings seemed longer to accommodate a 3rd engine. Livery was matte battleship gray, no markings, which I see somewhat often being close to Washington DC. But I've never seen a six-propeller aircraft before! What could it be, and how come nobody has any pics? (I couldn't get my phone out fast enough since I didn't hear it approaching.) Can anybody dig up any more info on the PAAF206? Flightradar24 gives the PAAF206 an ICAO 24-bit address of 7610D8, whatever that means. I googled that and got Flight PAF153 (https://www.radarbox.com/data/flights/PAF153) which seems to correlate with the same aircraft, but again, no info on it. Perhaps you all can keep an eye on this specific aircraft or do some more digging?