Drone incident

The commercial jetliner was flying around 7,000 feet when the incident occurred after taking off from Luton Airport in the UK. The drone and its operator were in the wrong twice as the aircraft was flown too high (legal limit is at 400 feet) and too close to the airport. The drone incident took place on May 6th this year.

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Various Swiss media have reported a collision between a drone and a helicopter in the Verzasca Valley. The collision happened high above the Verzasca Dam in the canton of Ticino, Switzerland, last Friday, May 25. The Swiss Security Investigation Service (SUST) has identified the drone pilot, a 42-year-old Swiss from the canton of Lucerne.

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AeroVironment Inc. has been accused that it has been trying to conceal that employees brought a military drone loaded with explosives on board of a Delta flight and that the company retaliated against a whistleblowing manager.

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The Deutsche Flugsicherung (DFS) air traffic authority in Germany said that incidents between drones and commercial jets in 2017 rose less than expected considering how popular the unmanned aerial devices have become. However, airlines around the world did express their concerns about drone incidents, which resulted in the International Air Transport Association backing efforts by the United Nations’ aviation agency, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) to develop a global drone registry as we reported earlier today.

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According to a report from UK Airprox Board, the country’s air safety agency, the Airbus 319 carrying 160 passengers almost hit a drone after taking off from Heathrow Airport. The commercial jet passed a mere 20 feet underneath the drone at an altitude of 4,800 feet. The incident happened on January 7 and received the highest possible risk rating from the board.

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In New Zealand a drone got dangerously close to an Air Force helicopter. The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) was spotted less then 200 feet away from the helicopter, which at the time of the incident flew at around 3,000 feet as it was approaching Auckland’s Whenuapai Air Force Base. Operations at the base were suspended for 30 minutes.

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A mishap during a drone test at the Pendleton UAS test range in Eastern Oregon resulted in a small fire last Saturday. Firefighters were called in to extinguish the fire. The range manager declined to mention what drone company or what unmanned aerial vehicle was involved.

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A drone pilot from Brisbane was handed a hefty $1,050 fine for flying a drone over an Ed Sheeran concert Wednesday, March 21. In doing so the drone operator broke several drone regulations, such as flying the drone at night, in a populated area, within 100 feet of people and beyond line-of-sight.

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Pilots of an Air New Zealand airliner with 278 people on board feared that the drone would get sucked into the engine as it comes within 15 feet of the passenger jet. Both the airline company and New Zealand’s Civil Aviation Authority are asking for a tightening of the drone regulations after this latest drone incident.

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According to the Coast Guard, the aircrew flying an MH-65 Dolphin helicopter came within 50 feet of hitting a drone in Port Angeles last Saturday. At the time of the near-miss with the recreational drone, the crew was 300 feet in the air near Fairchild International Airport, according to the Coast Guard.

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Canadian authorities are looking into a suspected drone collision with a Cessna 172 that caused $4,000 USD in damage. The drone incident occurred near an airport in  British Columbia. During a training flight, the Cessna 172, owned by Abbotsford-based Chinook Helicopters, was making its final approach at Chilliwack Airport when its left wing collided with the suspected unmanned aerial vehicle. The collision “left blue bits on the wing” of the Cessna, according to the flight school owner Cathy Press.

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Last weekend somebody flew what seems to be his (or her) DJI Phantom drone over Apple Park and accidentally crashed it onto the solar roof. The drone pilot then turned to Matthew Roberts, who posted a video of the ‘rescue operation’ on YouTube, for assistance in locating the unmanned aerial device. As you can see in the video the drone is wedged in between solar panels on the roof of Apple’s offices.

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A drone may have been involved in a helicopter’s crash landing in South Carolina earlier this week. This would make it the first drone-related aircraft crash in the United States. The incident happened on Wednesday around 2 pm as a student pilot was practicing low-altitude hovering in a remote area, according to Charleston Police Department report. Luckily both the student and the helicopter instructor were uninjured.

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The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the state Department of Land and Natural Resources have started an investigation into a report that a drone struck a Kauai tour helicopter.

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The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is launching an investigation into a drone pilot looping his or her unmanned aerial vehicle over a passenger jet landing at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas. It is unknown when this incident took place, but whoever was flying this drone, could face stiff fines and even criminal charges as it is illegal to fly a drone near an airport. Let alone this close over a landing passenger jet, endangering the lives of the people on board that plane.

This video is not the first drone incident we report on but it sure is the most reckless video we have seen.

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Today we learned about a very close call between a passenger jet that was about to land at London Heathrow and a drone that was flying at an elevation where it wasn’t supposed to be. The drone flew so close to the passenger jet that the crew thought it must have hit the tail of the airplane after it only missed the windshield by a mere five feet.

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Back in September, we reported on the DJI Phantom 4 Pro drone that had collided with a U.S. Army Sikorsky UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter flown by Fort Bragg soldiers over Staten Island. Luckily nobody was injured and the helicopter only sustained minor damage. The accident did become the first official drone-aircraft collision in the U.S. aviation history. The military started an investigation into the incident immediately and was able to identify the drone pilot based on the serial number found on parts of the drone that were logged in the helicopter.

Now the National Transportation Safety Board has released a full report on the drone incident.

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During the final descent to Los Angeles International Airport, photographer Simon Pollock from Melbourne spotted a DJI drone flying very close to his airplane. On Facebook he wrote:

Drones, All fun and games until you’re looking out your window on approach to LAX and you spot a Phantom just out your window (yeah a few hundred feet, but imagine if it.. well..) some people are utterly stupid.

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According to a UK Airprox Board report, a “DJI Mavic type” drone was spotted by a London City airliner right after taking off. The drone was spotted at approximately 3,000 feet elevation above Stratford, as the De Havilland Dash-8 turboprop airliner had just taken off from London City Airport.

The UK Airprox Board report is unusual as typically the type of drone is not specified. This time the “DJI Mavic type” drone was seen by the third pilot in the observer’s position. According to the same report, it was ‘endangering other aircraft’.

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Shortly after taking off from the Glasgow Airport in Scotland, the pilot of the Bombardier Dash 8 airplane, noticed a small flying object moving towards his plane. As the pilot was gaining altitude, the pilot reported that there was no time to avoid it. The incident report says that there was a ‘high’ risk of a collision between the drone and the airplane. According to a report from the Airpox board, the drone was only one hundred feet away from the airplane vertically and 45 feet away horizontally. The near-miss in Glasgow is the latest addition to our drone incident series.

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Two days ago we wrote about an FAA-commissioned study that had been released by a team from the Alliance for System Safety of UAS through Research Excellence (ASSURE), that concluded that drones colliding with large manned aircraft will likely cause more structural damage than birds with the same weight for a given impact speed.

Chinese drone manufacturer, DJI responded to the ASSURE report, in which a DJI Phantom 3 was used, with a public statement to address some of the concerns.

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