Debate grows over risk drones pose to aircraft

When the pilot of an Alitalia jetliner reported seeing a drone while approaching Kennedy Airport in New York in March 2013, the likelihood of a collision between a drone and a commercial jet seemed pretty remote.

But over the past two years, aviation experts and regulators have become increasingly concerned about the growing number of drones flying near airports and the risks they could potentially create for aviation safety. Last Saturday, for instance, a California Highway Patrol helicopter nearly crashed into a drone and the pilot avoided a collision only because he veered away.

“If you go through the windshield and you hit the pilot, that’s game over,” a highway patrol spokesman, Jim Andrews, told local reporters. “If it goes into the rotor blades, depending on where or what it hits, it could be the same situation.”

But while the number of drones is growing rapidly, their impact on flight safety is still being debated. More than 400,000 drones were sold last year and this year the Consumer Technology Association is forecasting sales of 700,000 more.

In August, the Federal Aviation Administration said reports of close calls by pilots had soared, even though FAA rules prohibit flying drones near airports. It reported cases in which commercial pilots had seen drones flying above 10,000 feet and pointed to instances in which firefighters battling wildfires in the western part of the country had to ground their operations after spotting drones nearby.

Drone enthusiasts criticized the agency as sensationalizing the issue as it seeks to regulate it. Critics, for instance, said laser beams pointed at pilots were a far bigger and more malicious threat to commercial aviation.

There have been more than 5,000 reports of lasers aimed at airplanes, a number that has risen over the past few years, according to pilot representatives. Also, aircraft last year recorded about 13,000 bird strikes, a well-known threat to aviation safety, according to FAA statistics.

The Academy of Model Aeronautics, which represents model plane hobbyists, produced its own report that found that only a tiny number of drones were involved in close encounters with airplanes where pilots had to take evasive action. The FAA itself has found only two instances of possible drone collisions with an aircraft, but has not been able to confirm either episode, according to a spokesman.

But Hulsey Smith, the chief executive of Aero Kinetics, a maker of commercial drones, said the risks of accidentally flying into the path of an airplane or a helicopter was statistically “just a matter of time.”

”The general public has no sense of how dangerous these toys really are,” he said. “If we don’t have an honest conversation about those risks, we could set this industry back years and decades.”

The FAA is considering requiring drone owners to register themselves when they acquire a drone, probably before the end of this year. Regulators are also working on new rules for commercial drone operators, which will be completed next year. Under those rules, drones would be barred from flying above 500 feet, or faster than 100 mph. Operators will also have to maintain a line of sight with drones.

Hulsey said that registering drone owners was a necessary first step but not enough. He supports setting up a system to certify a drone’s airworthiness to prove it can operate safely, and possibly equipping drones with costly tracking beacons or collision avoidance systems.

A study by two researchers at the Center for the Study of the Drone, at Bard College, released Friday, tries to provide a more comprehensive overview of the risks. The study broadened the definition of close encounter to include incidents in which a drone flew close to a plane, not just those in which a pilot had to take evasive action.

The study reviewed 922 incidents involving drones and manned aircraft in the national airspace over the past two years. These incidents were reported to the FAA and NASA’s Aviation Safety Reporting System, a confidential reporting system for pilots, from December 2013 to September 2015.

The researchers found that 326 incidents or 35 percent of the cases could be described as close encounters, defined as drones coming within 500 feet of aircraft.

In 158 of those cases, a drone came within 200 feet or less of an aircraft, and in 28 instances, a pilot reported having to maneuver to avoid a collision. The study also found 90 close encounters between an aircraft and a drone involved a commercial airplane, and 37 involved helicopters.

The locations with the most incidents were:

• New York/Newark, New Jersey, 86;
• Los Angeles, 39;
• Miami, 24;
• Chicago, 20;
• Boston, 20;
• San Jose, 19;
• Washington, DC, 19;
• Atlanta, 17;
• Seattle, 17; and
• San Diego, 14.

Arthur Holland Michel, one author of the study, said regulators and policymakers, as well as the public, needed more accurate and impartial data to get a better understanding of the risks.

“The seriousness of the problem is still somewhat up for debate in terms of the particulars,” he said, about whether a drone could bring down a commercial airliner or whether the episodes represent malicious intent.

“But the challenge of integrating drones in the domestic airspace can only be addressed through a combination of solutions,” he said. “And it will take collaboration between the industry, the regulators and the drone users.”

Information from Associated Press was included in this report.

This story was originally published December 11, 2015 at 12:18 PM with the headline "Debate grows over risk drones pose to aircraft."