By Brenda Flanagan
Correspondent
A little drone — tiny camera attached — lifts off effortlessly, buzzing around the Palisades in Fort Lee. Professional photographer Rick Morris flies drones for fun and profit.
That’s why Morris winces when he hears reports of drones cruising too near airports, especially in the very crowded skies over New York and New Jersey.
“The people that break the rules just make it that much more difficult for the people like myself and my friends who don’t. We want to be able to fly unrestricted because we obey the rules,” he said.
FAA rules state drones must steer miles clear of manned aircraft and fly no higher than 400 feet. Commercial jets fly at over 1,000.
But there was this exchange last Friday, between JFK Airport’s control tower and a Delta pilot at 1,300 feet.
DELTA 407: Yeah, about a mile back there was a drone flying just under the southwest side of this abandoned airport here.
TOWER: At what altitude would you say that was?
DELTA 407: I would say probably about 100 feet below us, just off our right wing.
TOWER: Roger.
Three planes flying into JFK encountered a drone near the abandoned Floyd Bennett Field, and on Sunday near Sewell, Gloucester County, a small plane pilot reported swerving to avoid a drone. The FAA gets reports like this daily now.
If a very small drone impacts a plane, it’d probably be all right, say experts like Todd Curtis, but, “If there was a larger drone — let’s say, a 10- or 20-pound drone — striking an airliner going at let’s say 250 miles an hour, it’s possible that it could cause enough damage to seriously compromise an engine. And if a larger drone were to hit a windscreen at that speed it’s possible that it could go through that windscreen and injure or incapacitate the pilot,” he said.
The potential danger reportedly prompted the Department of Homeland Security to issue a general warning to law enforcement that drones could possibly be used as weapons by terrorists. Sen. Chuck Schumer’s response: the FAA should mandate geo-fencing, software that would automatically disable drones that fly — by accident or design — into no-drone zones.
“And there are some prosecutions that will very likely be done if people are caught doing this sort of thing. It’s an ongoing battle and there’s really no clear strategy that the FAA has right now to prevent these kinds of near-misses from happening in the future,” Curtis said.
“I was shooting a film last week and I had three police officers come and make me land before I was able to do my closing shot. It is what it is. I’m just dealing with the rules the way they are,” Morris said.
Industry experts figure drone sales could top three quarters of a million this year alone, so operating them properly is obviously an issue that’s not going to fly away anytime soon.