FAA banning drone flights over New Jersey, New York sites

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Federal Aviation Administration said on Thursday it was temporarily barring drone flights over dozens of critical infrastructure sites in New Jersey and New York.

A frenzy of concern about drones in New Jersey and surrounding states has prompted a dramatic spike in the number of people in the area pointing lasers at airplanes flying overhead, which is illegal and can be dangerous, the FAA said on Wednesday.

U.S. agencies have repeatedly said that the spike in drone sightings does not pose national security risks and that they appear to be mostly aircraft, stars or hobbyist drones.

The federal government in recent days has also sent drone monitoring equipment to New Jersey and New York.

The FAA said the decision to ban drones for 30 days at 22 New Jersey utility sites was made in an abundance of caution at the request of federal security agencies after the aviation authority barred flights over two locations in the state in November.

The locations subject to the temporary ban across New Jersey include PSE&G electrical switching stations, substations, generating stations, a utility command center and other facilities in places including Elizabeth, Edison, South Brunswick, Camden, Metuchen and Bridgewater.

The FAA late on Thursday temporarily barred drone flights for 30 days at 29 New York sites, including multiple locations in New York City as well as Yonkers, Melville, Oceanside, New Castle, Far Rockaway and Holbrook.

New York Governor Kathy Hochul said in a statement she had spoken to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and he told her the FAA planned to grant temporary flight restrictions over some of New York’s critical infrastructure sites.

“This action is purely precautionary; there are no threats to these sites,” Hochul said.

The FAA also said on Thursday that it was extending prohibitions on drones over President-elect Donald Trump’s golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, through Jan. 31.

The Department of Homeland Security said the New Jersey restrictions “do not impact manned aviation including airplanes and helicopters,” adding it saw no “evidence of a threat”.

The FAA said on Wednesday that reports are up 269% to 59 in the first half of December, compared with eight in the same period last year. The FAA said it has received dozens of new laser reports from pilots in New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania airspace.

The FBI in New Jersey warned people on Wednesday not to shoot at suspected drones or point lasers at them, warning that “there could be dangerous and possibly deadly consequences if manned aircraft are targeted mistakenly” as drones.

Officials have repeatedly said that most of the large fixed-wing sightings involved manned aircraft, and came after Trump on Monday called for more federal comment on the reported sightings.

There are about 1 million registered drones flying about 42 million flights annually. Drone flights are generally legal up to 400 feet unless over restricted areas such as airports.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama, Mark Porter, Leslie Adler and Saad Sayeed)