Gatwick Airport (UK) suspends flights due to Drone activity

[Johnmcl7]

MAY have been no drone. Of course there may have been no drone, we've been discussing this since it all started, the police are just keeping an open mind (this is a good thing in case it isn't obvious). Their only mistake is saying this to our stoopid media.

There's no way they'd be saying it if it wasn't a distinct possibility particularly this early on, there's no denying there's a surprising lack of corroborating evidence.

 

[zocalo]

To be honest I don't know how anyone familiar with drone technology could believe it possible to carry out sustained flights in the same area without being captured by a camera nor being caught by another drone, helicopter or similar.

It's been made pretty clear that it's not been "sustained flights", it's been a combination of "sightings" (which may or may not have been a drone) and "better safe than sorry" reactions that have closed the airfield for far longer than may have been necessary each time. Some (or perhaps even all, although I think that unlikely) of those shutdowns may also have been in response to false alarms, reducing the actual number of flights necessary even further.

If you actually think about what is being *said* in the various articles and soundbites, it's entirely possible that there have only been a handful of actual flights over the three days to trigger the number of reported sightings and shutdowns. Each of those flights also only needed to last long enough to get a sighting before the airport was shutdown.

Given Gatwick's perimeter is ~10km and is surrounded by a decent mix of rural, residential, and commercial land, I think it's entirely possible that someone with a little knowledge of the area and some luck could make that many flights and leave the scene without being apprehended. Especially if they were retrieving the drone from a different location than it took off to avoid loitering.

From experience working on building a terminal, most cameras at airports also tend to focussed on the ground - they're mainly concerned with the movements of planes, passengers, and staff. There are also a lot of wide-angle cameras that cover the airfield at large that might - just - register the drone as a dot, assuming they have enough resolution, older ones will still be analogue and simply won't have the resolution. I do find it strange that none of the press or plane spotters etc. in the area failed to get a decent shot, but given they're looking for an unpredictable <1m³ target in a volume of more than 100million m³, perhaps that's not so surprising either?

 

[bmaudsley]

Have you seen this report from the Guardian newspaper, maybe not even a drone!!!

Gatwick: suspects exonerated as confusion deepens over drone attack

 

[Tazbone]

So the couple arrested have been released without charge.
Apparently as the cops do,they turned over their house in the search process and found nothing...also adding the only reason for the arrest was the guy was charged with flying a RC helicopter 2 years ago and was charged for that offence.

The guy.... Like myself x military.
He's put is leather in theatres such as Northern Ireland and Bosnia.

Amazing how the filth don't go into certain areas of the UK as quick when little girls are plyed with drink and drugs and then passed around for sex.

I hope this guy and his wife find a solicitor who will help them claim as much compensation as possible for their ordeal.

Great Britain eh....You're having a laugh.

 

[SpinItUp]

BBC News - Gatwick 'no drone' police comment 'miscommunicated'
Miscommunication blamed for drone confusion

 

[choo choo]

Latest...Surrey police raced to a report of a drone hovering above a bus stop, six miles from the airport...to find it was the anti collision lights on the tower cranes...this is becoming like an episode of the Three Stooges

 

[Tazbone]

Latest...Surrey police raced to a report of a drone hovering above a bus stop, six miles from the airport...to find it was the anti collision lights on the tower cranes...this is becoming like an episode of the Three Stooges

I can hear the theme tune to The Benny Hill show.

 

[FoxhallGH]

It's not strange at all as the reason they're saying it's a possibility is because there is no concrete evidence of the drone, even if there was no CCTV pointing upwards at an airport there was a huge amount of phone cameras around even before it became headline news there will have been a number of high end cameras looking to capture a picture or video of the drone as that would be worth a fortune. Eye witness reports can be useful to point investigators in the right direction but on their own they're usually unreliable as a whole and in this case it appears the police haven't been able to corroborate the eye witness reports. Gatwick control staff did not identify the type of drone, that does in fact highlight the problem with eye witness reports in that they're completely inconsistent and they contradict each other with a supposed fleet of different models of drones that were flying.

I don't dismiss the possibility there was a drone but the stories we've been told from the start have never made the slightest bit of sense, even aside from the lack of photo/video evidence at one of the busiest airports in Europe there's the fact these drones mysteriously appeared and disappeared making it impossible to track them. There's nothing mystical about drones though and with a limited runtime, speed and range at the very least they've have been able to capture footage of these drones and narrow down their landing/take off position. The suggestion has been the take off/landing position was constantly changed to avoid detection but given the way it was plastered all over the news, people would have reported if they'd seen any drones landing or taking off.

To be honest I don't know how anyone familiar with drone technology could believe it possible to carry out sustained flights in the same area without being captured by a camera nor being caught by another drone, helicopter or similar.

It's quite easy to see how you could keep you and your drone hidden in the local area ... Just have a look at the Goggle earth view of Gatwick, it's about 60% surrounded by fields, plantations and hedgerows. It would not take much planning to launch & recover a drone and move on before you were found ...

 

[Bazzam]

Latest...Surrey police raced to a report of a drone hovering above a bus stop, six miles from the airport...to find it was the anti collision lights on the tower cranes...this is becoming like an episode of the Three Stooges

Who gets information about anything from the Sun newspaper? I wouldn't even trust it to tell me the day of the week [emoji39]

 

[sdcpilot]

it appears that there was a police miscommunication at Gatwick, causing the drone confusion. that's a pretty costly mistake

 

[SpinItUp]

it appears that there was a police miscommunication at Gatwick, causing the drone confusion. that's a pretty costly mistake

NotSafeSherlock welcome to the thread...comment #425 (a few back)Gatwick Airport (UK) suspends flights due to Drone activity

zzzzzzzzzzz

 

[choo choo]

Who gets information about anything from the Sun newspaper? I wouldn't even trust it to tell me the day of the week [emoji39]

It’s about as reliable as all the rest of the information.
I bet the pantomime script writers are hastily adding a few more gags...
It’s behind you
No it isn’t
Oh yes it is
Oh no it isn’t

 

[SpinItUp]

It’s about as reliable as all the rest of the information.
I bet the pantomime script writers are hastily adding a few more gags...
It’s behind you
No it isn’t
Oh yes it is
Oh no it isn’t

Gagwick Airport

 

[Jackcutrone]

latest Reports are that the deputy chief superintendent is being slammed by the government for adding that confusion by making that statement. There were photos and videos

What do the deniers think? all a conspiracy by CAA to create a hoax and shutdown the airport for some mysterious reason?

 

[choo choo]

latest Reports are that the deputy chief superintendent is being slammed by the government for adding that confusion by making that statement. There were photos and videos

What do the deniers think? all a conspiracy by CAA to create a hoax and shutdown the airport for some mysterious reason?

I voiced the opinion right from the start that “something is fishy” about this whole fiasco, and now a deputy chief superintendent has, to all intents and purposes, been told by the government to change his story and that there definitely was active drones above the airport. I’m not sure exactly how many members of the government were present during this debacle, my guess it’s bugger all.
There were NO substantiated photos or videos... NOT ONE
The story that the deputy has been told to punt out to the public is that they were investigating 67 drones seen above Gatwick!! Which is as likely as me seeing Elvis in Tesco

 

[sar104]

I voiced the opinion right from the start that “something is fishy” about this whole fiasco, and now a deputy chief superintendent has, to all intents and purposes, been told by the government to change his story and that there definitely was active drones above the airport. I’m not sure exactly how many members of the government were present during this debacle, my guess it’s bugger all.
There were NO substantiated photos or videos... NOT ONE
The story that the deputy has been told to punt out to the public is that they were investigating 67 drones seen above Gatwick!! Which is as likely as me seeing Elvis in Tesco

I'm guessing that you know perfectly well that 67 reported drone sightings doesn't mean there were 67 drones. Conflating those two things really drowns out any serious point that you might have been trying to make.

 

[gnirtS]

The problem is a certain percentage of the drone community behave like spoilt children demanding "their rights" to do whatever they want regardless of effects on third parties. A lot of hobbies self-police and keep the idiots under control. Sadly with drones in general there are enough spoilt kids prepared to completely ignore the rules and laws that means regulation is inevitable. It's not grown up enough to prove it can behave like responsible adults.

What likely happened here was 1, MAYBE 2 drone flights. Then spurious imaginary sightings for day after that. Thats why the police can't catch them - because they weren't there in the first place.

 

[FoxhallGH]

I voiced the opinion right from the start that “something is fishy” about this whole fiasco, and now a deputy chief superintendent has, to all intents and purposes, been told by the government to change his story and that there definitely was active drones above the airport. I’m not sure exactly how many members of the government were present during this debacle, my guess it’s bugger all.
There were NO substantiated photos or videos... NOT ONE
The story that the deputy has been told to punt out to the public is that they were investigating 67 drones seen above Gatwick!! Which is as likely as me seeing Elvis in Tesco

Well - it's been substantial enough for Gatwick Airport to pay £5 Million in anti-drone defences in the last week. Global Infrastructure Partners - who run Gatwick - and their shareholders will not be pleased they have had to take that hit on their bottom line, and would not have done that for an imaginary reason. I'm sure they would have much preferred singing along to 'ain't nothing but a hound-dog' with the Elvis tribute act at my Tesco last week ...
[67 sightings of Drones - please ... Not 67 drones!]

 

[sar104]

What likely happened here was 1, MAYBE 2 drone flights. Then spurious imaginary sightings for day after that. Thats why the police can't catch them - because they weren't there in the first place.

Why do you think that's the explanation - either in terms of the number of flights or why they were not caught? It seems more likely that most of the documented sightings were accurate since they were not isolated reports, and that they were not caught because there was no easy method to track them. And the flights presumably stopped either because the perpetrators decided to quit before getting caught or because the counter-UAV measures that were deployed were successful.

 

[choo choo]

Well there’s not been one single substantiated photo or video of either 67 drones or 67 sightings of one drone despite the thousands of cameras, both high tech and low tech abounding the area. Only several weeks earlier a police helicopter spotted a drone flying near it on thermal imaging and followed it to where it landed and then filmed the bloke collecting it and going back to his house. It was THAT easy for them to spot and follow on thermal camera.
There were a purported THREE police helicopters flying around Gatwick, even if there was just one, but reported three times, then how come it never saw any drone or drones, despite the airport director saying that they were above his runway as we speak, they were allegedly witnessed to be buzzing the control tower by ground staff. And NOT ONE credible photo or video exists out of the whole 36hrs and thousands of cameras. In the U.K., you only have to fart and someone knows about it, vehicles are tracked up and down the entire country by ANPR (automatic number plate recognition cameras) our cities are ringed with them, if you drive into one with a wanted marker or uninsured car, it pings into the control room and a police vehicle will intercept you.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist, I’m a normal sensible human being who believes that an absence of evidence is evidence of absence. Its correct that the airport spends money
on bolstering it’s defences, the shareholders would be right to demand it because if it happened again, it would hit their revenue hard yet, to do nothing having seen what a disaster it turned out to be, (drone or no drone), would be at best daft, at worst, negligent, this little experiment has proven that airports are extraordinarily vulnerable.