Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey, one of three main airports that serve New York City, halted operations for nearly two hours after two pilots on different planes spotted a drone nearby as they came in for landings. Law enforcement agencies were still investigating the sightings, but so far no drone has been located, a federal aviation official said Wednesday.
The disruption was all the more alarming because it came just one month after reported drone sightings caused the shutdown of Gatwick Airport in London, one of the busiest in Europe.
The upheaval at Newark illustrated how vulnerable the air-travel system is to the proliferation of inexpensive drones that can weigh as much as 50 pounds and are capable of flying high and fast enough to get in the path of commercial jets, experts on aviation safety and drone technology said. It also raised questions about whether airports are prepared enough to identify drones and prevent them from paralyzing travel and leaving passengers stranded.
“This is a really disturbing trend,” said John Halinski, former deputy administrator of the federal Transportation Security Administration. “It is a real problem because drones are multiplying every day. They really pose a threat in a number of ways to civil aviation.”
Pilots fear drones because tests have proved that they could cause the “takedown of an aircraft,” Halinski said. Although technology exists that can detect and deter drones, it is not used at most major airports, he said. “I can’t think of a major airport with anti-drone type of capability,” he said.
A spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates Newark Liberty as well as Kennedy International and LaGuardia airports, declined to discuss how the airports cope with drones, “for security reasons.”
In a statement, the Port Authority said “the presence of drone activity near major airports is a serious threat to public safety and can cause significant disruption to flight operations, impacting thousands of passengers.”
The agency said it was committed to keeping its airports “at the forefront of protection and technology.”
Last week, the Port Authority said, it held a meeting with local, state and federal agencies “to review and enhance protocols for the rapid detection and interdiction of drones.”
At Gatwick, the drone sightings led to the grounding or diversion of more than 1,000 flights over three days, affecting more than 140,000 passengers in Britain. London’s Heathrow Airport was shut down briefly this month after a reported drone sighting. Neither incident resulted in any damages or charges.
Drone operators, both recreational and commercial, are required to register with the Federal Aviation Administration if their aircraft weighs more than about half a pound. More than 1.2 million drones have now been registered, according to the FAA.
Regulations bar drones from flying more than 400 feet above the ground, though hobbyists and companies can apply for a waiver to fly higher. The FAA has granted just 20 of those waivers.
Operators also must seek permission from air traffic controllers to fly within 5 miles of an airport, or they risk possible criminal punishment. In the New York area, the restricted airspace is expansive and complicated, with the three main airports and one serving private aircrafts — Teterboro Airport — all within several miles of Manhattan. The pilots that spotted the drone Tuesday were flying over Teterboro at the time.
Besides the fear of a drone being sucked into a jet’s engine, there are concerns about other ways a drone — known in aviation circles as an unmanned aircraft system, or UAS — could cause damage or distract a pilot.
A study from the Alliance for System Safety of UAS Through Research Excellence, which was conducted in concert with the FAA, showed that batteries that power small drones could cause fires in collisions with commercial aircrafts.
“The damage could be severe,” said Gerardo Olivares, a researcher at Wichita State University who helped conduct the study.
Until now, the FAA and other regulators have been concerned that the technology to keep drones away from airports could interfere with radar and air-traffic control systems. But in the fall, President Donald Trump signed legislation that authorized the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice to develop measures to counter the use of drones. (The departments of defense and energy already had that authorization.)
Proponents of the use of drones say technology exists to keep drones away from airports and other facilities, like prisons and sports stadiums. But so far, it can be used only for detection, not deterrence, they say.
“The only thing we can do is detect the drone,” said James Barnes, founder of the Drone Academy, a training center in Ringoes, New Jersey. Barnes said federal regulators have barred the use of the technology to either block drones from flying over a particular area, to force a drone to the ground or to trace it back to its operator.
Adam Bry, chief executive and founder of drone company Skydio who previously worked on drones at Google, said that regulation alone cannot properly control the danger that drones pose at airports. “Ultimately, the best solutions are going to be technology-based,” he said. “No matter what rules you have, it is very, very difficult to deal with bad actors unless you have the ability to monitor the airspace and take action.”
Startups such as SkySafe and AirMap are exploring technologies that identify drones, jam their radio signals or ground them in other ways. SkySafe, founded by an ex-Air Force officer, has been working on drone tracking and signal jamming technology for about three years, and is now supplying its technology to the Navy. It is now in discussions with airports, stadium operators and other commercial companies.
But unless they are working with the government, these companies do not yet have the legal authority to interfere with drone flight, said Jonathan Rupprecht, a Florida-based lawyer who specializes in drones.
After air-traffic disruptions caused by drones, many people wonder why police do not simply shoot down offending drones. Adam Lisberg, a spokesman for DJI Technology, a drone maker, said such action is generally prohibited.
“It is right now illegal in most cases to interfere with a drone in flight,” Lisberg said. “Drones are considered aircraft.”
Lisberg joined others in the pro-drone crowd in expressing doubts about the reported sightings Tuesday. He said it was “extremely unlikely” that somebody flying a plane at about 250 mph spotted a small drone just as the sun was setting.
But Barnes said he found the reports plausible because some hobbyists “think they want to fly with the big boys.”
He said that several years ago he sent a drone from Flemington, New Jersey, across the state to the Jersey Shore, where it circled The Stone Pony bar in Asbury Park twice before returning. All the while, he said, the drone flew 5,000 to 10,000 feet off the ground.
Nowadays, he said, he stays under the FAA’s 400-foot ceiling even while operating missions for police departments and other government agencies. Among his current assignments, he said, is counting deer for the New Jersey Farm Bureau.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.