Lib Dem Transport Spokesperson Jenny Randerson has written for Politics Home about the need for regulation of drones for safety reasons.
So why are they a problem? Apart from the obvious terrorism and defence related issues, there are some more ordinary dangers:
In 2016 the police dealt with 3,456 incidents involving drones; that was 12 times the number of incidents logged in 2014, so the problems – like drone ownership – are growing rapidly.
Possibly the greatest risk is to aircraft. Drones can smash the windscreen or break the rotor blades in the case of helicopters, which would bring the aircraft down. Research by Balpa, the pilots’ association, in conjunction with the government, has amply demonstrated this vulnerability to a drone simply being flown inexpertly or by someone foolishly taking a risk, rather than deliberately setting out to do harm.
So what can be done to mitigate the risks from drones? Jenny argues for many different measures:
There are a host of actions the government needs to take seriously. A good start would be compulsory registration of drones and compulsory training for all users.
Mandatory geo-fencing around airports would seem to be obvious to avoid genuine accidents as well as deliberate terrorist attacks.
Currently air traffic controllers cannot “see” drones and instead rely on pilots physically catching sight of them as they whizz past, so we need investment in the best new technology to help air traffic control. Obviously there are resource issues for police and the CAA as well.
You can read the whole article here.
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One Comment
It would seem the first thing that needs doing is for the those who advocate such a policy to get up to speed on the actual rules and the technical possibilities.
Drones operators are legally obliged to contact air traffic control if they fly with 3 miles of the controlled zone around an airport, most people have the common sense not to do so in the first place.
Of course drones can be picked up on approach radars, look at the recent TV series on Dubai International Airport for a classic example.
Geo fencing relies on GPS and RFID for functionality. RFID(Garage and car door type technology) has a range of 15-20 metres at best, a drone is restricted to an altitude of 130m(400ft). See the problem.
GPS control zones for geo-fencing would have to be built into the firmware of the drone controller to be effective. Currently you can get identical controllers and radios that have functionality limited to an EU set of limited set of parameters, or you can completely by-pass the EU regulations by buying a controller/radio with full functionality for non-EU countries. I would be interested to see how you could stop that trade, or people making their own fully functioning controllers and radios from discrete components and easily programmable cheap processors, and of course there are plenty of people out there, who could rewrite firmware to do anything , which will then be made available to others open source.
You currently need a licence to fly a drone commercially, and to my knowledge the odd incident around the world that has resulted in a small drone impacting an aircraft has caused little damage( most of them are under 2kg), and was caused because the drone was flying higher than the regulations allow.
The reality is, most people are law abiding and stick to the rules, and those that don’t, are not going to do so just because somebody tells them. This is a completely unenforceable sledgehammer to crack a nut, where the technological infrastructure to deal with it, would last as long as it took somebody to come up with a workaround.
Let me give you two examples of where government has had to capitulate on a technology, because they couldn’t stop it legally. CB Radio, and long range radio handsfree phones and two way radios, all eventually replaced by government capitulating and legalising their own version of the same thing to avoid complete humiliation.