The Federal Aviation Administration on Thursday said it was temporarily barring drone flights over 22 utility locations in New Jersey amid public concern.
The FAA said the decision to bar drones for 30 days at the sites was made in an abundance of caution at the request of federal security agencies after the agency barred flights over two locations in New Jersey in November.
The new locations across the state include PSE&G electrical switching stations, substations, generating stations, a utility command center and other facilities in places like Elizabeth, Edison, South Brunswick, Camden, Metuchen and Bridgewater.
PSE&G did not immediately comment.
A frenzy of concern about drones in New Jersey and surrounding states has prompted of people in the area pointing lasers at airplanes flying overhead, which is illegal and can be dangerous, the FAA said on Wednesday.
No National Risk
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 Department of Homeland Security noted that the restrictions “do not impact manned aviation including airplanes and helicopters. While DHS and our federal partners continue to see no evidence of a threat, the purpose of the TFR is to discourage drone flights around these areas, as requested by the critical infrastructure partners.”
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 U.S. President-elect Donald 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.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Mark Porter)
Topics USA Aviation New Jersey
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