EasyJet Plane Near Miss Highlights Airports’ Drone Problem

February 24, 2021 | Eric Danis

An EasyJet plane traveling at 320 miles per hour just after leaving the Manchester, UK airport, nearly collided with a recklessly piloted drone, according to MSN.

The Daily Mail offers details on the flight that took off in September of 2020 and carried 186 passengers:

“A report by the UK Airprox Board which investigates near misses rated it as the most dangerous Category A incident meaning there was a serious risk of collision…

The number of near misses between aircraft and drones has soared dramatically in recent years as the devices have become more popular, leading to fears of a catastrophic accident.

Experts fear that an impact with a heavy drone could disable a jet engine or cause serious injury to pilots by smashing a jet’s windscreen.”

D-Fend Solutions Can Help

Our flagship counter-drone takeover solution, EnforceAir, uses non-jamming and non-kinetic technologies to keep airspace safe, including takeoff and landing runways and airstrips.

Flight schedules proceed as planned, backed by an autonomous system that asserts control over rogue drones and lands them safely in a designated zone. The solution co-exists with airport wireless communications.

EnforceAir can extract a unique identifier (known as a tail number) per drone, sourced from the drone’s communication. Authorized drones can then be tagged as “authorized” to fly in certain areas of the airport, even while mitigation of rogue drones is occurring. This classification capability is absent from radars and other traditional detection systems.

EnforceAir also provides airport authorities with preventive notifications while extracting crucial data – such as the drone take-off position and pilot remote control location, so authorities can alert specific at-risk flights and emergency personnel.