Attack of the Drones
The ever-increasing popularity of drones presents a challenge to aviation safety. Near misses have been reported at Heathrow Airport among others in recent times (References 1 and 2), and airports are responding.
Figure 1: Drone.
Drone Registration
The Irish Aviation Authority requires all drones weighing 1 kg or more to be registered by a user. All registered users must be over 16 years of age (Reference 3).
Dublin Drone Ban
Dublin Airport has had incidents (Reference 4) with drone users near the airport. Consequently, they have put up signage at the airport to discourage users from flying drones. The campaign is designed to raise awareness and inform/remind users that flying a drone over the airport is illegal.
The rules on using drones in Ireland may be updated to increase safety following proposed changes within EU legislation (Reference 5) which could make registration rules more stringent.
References
- BBC, November 2016, Drone and plane in ‘very near miss’ over central London (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-38011104 last accessed March 2017).
- Nicholas Cecil, January 2017, Revealed: 13 near misses with drones at London airports last year, Evening Standard (http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/revealed-13-near-misses-with-drones-at-london-airports-last-year-a3449196.html last accessed March 2017).
- IAA, Drone Registration (https://www.iaa.ie/general-aviation/drones/drone-registration/ last accessed March 2017).
- Dublin Airport, February 2017, Dublin Airport Launches No Drone Zone Awareness Campaign (https://www.dublinairport.com/latest-news/detail/dublin-airport-launches-no-drone-zone-awareness-campaign/ last accessed March 2017).
- The Journal IE, February 2017, ‘No Drone Zone’: Dublin Airport launches campaign to safeguard flying space (http://www.thejournal.ie/drones-dublin-ban-3261484-Feb2017/ last accessed March 2017).
