
Gatwick drones: Two arrested over flight disruption - lakis
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-46657505
======
sytelus
Interesting bits...

 _One piece of equipment believed to have been deployed at the airport is the
Israeli-developed Drone Dome system, which can detect drones using radar. It
can also jam communications between the drone and its operator, enabling
authorities to take control of and land the drone._

 _In a move known as "buzzing the tower", it emerged the perpetrator had
taunted airport staff by circling the drone around the building and flashing
its lights_

 _A detailed description of the drone, provided by witnesses, meant experts
were able to determine the make and model of the machine, which is only
available from a handful of locations in the UK._

 _Police and military experts were deployed to search for the operators of the
drones, which reappeared near the airport every time the authorities tried to
reopen the runways._

TLDR; There are no sure fire way to track down offender and police mainly
relied on informants and traditional detective work of identifying drone and
who might have purchased it.

Better coverage is here:

[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/12/22/gatwick-
airport-...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/12/22/gatwick-airport-
drone-chaos-man-woman-arrested-passengers-brace/)

[https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/22/gatwick-
dron...](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/22/gatwick-drone-
arrests-two-people-held-over-disruption-of-airport)

~~~
geoah
I've seen a lot of suggestions floating around on jamming the signal. But that
assumes that there is an active operator and not a drone that has been told to
go between a pre set list of coordinates. Most high end should support gps
navigation so I assuming that you have enough money and don't need to ever
recover a drone after it's out of battery you can probably increase your
chances of not getting caught.

~~~
kierenj
Then you jam GPS

~~~
janoc
Jamming GPS _at an around an airport_ is not that great idea given that the
airliners rely on it for navigation.

Granted, they have other means of navigating when the GPS isn't available but
in the extremely busy airspace around London this would be just asking for a
big problem.

~~~
jbg_
I don’t know much about GPS jamming, but I know a fair bit about how airliners
navigate. GPS is usually not used for final approach, which is typically
either visual or ILS (a radio signal transmitted from the ground). This in
contrast to the earlier stages of approach which may use GPS depending on the
airport and the specific approach in use. If you can keep the jamming signal
contained to the immediate airport vicinity and a few thousand feet above,
there should be little or no impact on (non-drone) aircraft navigation.

~~~
panarky
Truck driver uses a GPS jammer so his boss can't track him, then drives by
Newark airport, disrupting their "Smartpath" precision navigation system.

Source: [https://www.cnet.com/news/truck-driver-has-gps-jammer-
accide...](https://www.cnet.com/news/truck-driver-has-gps-jammer-accidentally-
jams-newark-airport/)

Smartpath: [https://aerospace.honeywell.com/en/products/navigation-
and-s...](https://aerospace.honeywell.com/en/products/navigation-and-
sensors/smartpath-ground-based-augmentation-system)

------
FlowNote
Given the shockingly naive comments about drone disabling being proposed, I'm
going to assume only a very tiny handful of people who visit this site has
ever flown or seen a drone before. Let's cure some of this naivety:

\- GPS jamming doesn't jam video feed.

\- Wifi and radio jamming doesn't stop landmark-driven/return-to-home
navigation.

\- UK refusal to fire on the craft is absurd because rubber bullets,
simunitions, and less-than-lethal rounds are more than capable of
destabilizing the hull and structure of the craft... while inflicting no
damage on distant landed craft or personnel. (I wouldn't expect HN to know
this, tbh)

-Sending piles of off-the-shelf consumer drones up to ram into it would have been sufficient as well.

Because of those last two points, the bumbling incompetence of UK security
forces suggests to me that this event is purely pretext for even more rigid
anti-drone legislation in a country that already has extreme anti-drone
legislation. If true, then the question is, "What has changed that has made
Airstrip One suddenly paranoid about drones?"

~~~
ddalex
It seems to me that yourself miss a couple of points:

\- the drones were flying high. Show me any sharpshooter that can shot down a
highly agile and impredictible target at 200m high. Clay pigeons are shot at
60m on a very predictable trajectory, and even that requires a lot of skill
and training.

\- drones flying on preprogrammed path are impossible to intercept
electronically, with the exception of GPS spoofing. Even that is difficult,
never mind deploying GPS spoofers around the airport

\- it would make the airplane operations impossible, so can't fly while the
GPS spoofers are running, and when they're not running, there is drone flying

\- the complexity of keeping drones in the air for long times (replacing
batteries, field repairs, having spare parts) is not to be underestimated.
This suggests a planned operation

~~~
DBYCZ
I wonder if it is possible to disable a drone with a barrage of powerful air
vortices. This would solve the GPS/camera navigation problem without disabling
aircraft systems, and it would prevent any collateral damage caused by
launching projectiles in the air.

[https://youtu.be/IN_N_J1yx-U?t=331](https://youtu.be/IN_N_J1yx-U?t=331)

It would need to be vehicle mounted and automated to fire rapidly, but would
be interesting to see in action. (And probably a lot of fun to operate)

------
dgellow
Seems to be a very cheap (and relatively safe) way to cause a lot of financial
damage. I wonder if we will see more of such events coming from activist or
foreign agents trying to destabilize a system.

~~~
bicubic
There's an infinite number of ways to asymmetrically attack a system. A single
person in Australia caused millions of dollars of damage by just sticking
needles into strawberries in supermarkets. People have rented and driven light
vehicles into crowds. People have deliberately poisoned food at restaurants.
The attack surface is limited only by the imagination, while defending against
each scenario carries immense financial and personal freedom cost.

The whole point of asymmetric attacks is that they use the size of the target
against it. It's impossible to stop these kinds of attacks without completely
taking away personal freedoms and instituting some kind of pre-crime
surveillance state.

And a pre-crime surveillance state is exactly what most governments seem to
want to build today. The historical scales are rapidly tipping towards tyranny
in the name of illusionary safety. As Franklin aptly put it, "They who can
give up essential Liberty to obtain a little temporary Safety, deserve neither
Liberty nor Safety".

As far as drones go, it's comparatively simple to build what's effectively a
supersonic missile for about 10K usd worth of easily obtainable hobbyist
parts. It's been possible for the better part of the decade. The fact that no
one has done it suggests that maybe there aren't that many bad actors out
there after all.

~~~
orbital-decay
> It's impossible to stop these kinds of attacks without completely taking
> away personal freedoms and instituting some kind of pre-crime surveillance
> state.

It's likely impossible in that kind of state as well.

~~~
SolarNet
Well if you ignore the commission of crimes by government officials charged
with that power, it might mostly work. If only because those bad actors will
just work for the government.

------
philip1209
Hello from Gatwick airport. Arrived Wednesday evening. About to board my third
scheduled flight. I hope it doesn't get cancelled again!

As an American, the British response to this seems very restrained. If this
incident happened in the USA, I would have expected tight, armed security
everywhere in the airport. Gatwick just seems like business as usual.

~~~
tomalpha
That seems about right. There doesn’t appear to be an armed threat against the
airport. Lots more guns would seem like security theatre. (Not that that
doesn’t happen ever).

------
olivermarks
I wonder if Gatwick used their Aeyreon Skyranger drones to track the drones
[http://www.guildford-dragon.com/2016/04/08/49799/](http://www.guildford-
dragon.com/2016/04/08/49799/) Odd that there has been no news footage of the
offending drones, you'd think they would be very visible...

~~~
DougBTX
Best I’ve seen was [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-
sussex-46649704](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-46649704)

~~~
olivermarks
exactly...

~~~
olivermarks
[https://www.aeryon.com/skyranger/r60/](https://www.aeryon.com/skyranger/r60/)
'tracks objects up to 3 miles away...'

Vector Target Tracking

Aeryon’s Vector Target Tracking software automatically targets and tracks
moving objects up to 3 miles away. The tracking algorithm adapts in real-time
to changes in target shape and maintains a hold on the target even when its
position changes or another object obstructs the view.

Moving Target Indication of up to 10 Objects In Both EO and IR Calculate
Target Heading and Speed

------
m0zg
Can't help but wonder, what was the goal? What were they hoping to achieve
with it, and how did they expect to get away?

~~~
dsl
According to The Telegraph, government officials suspect an "eco terrorist."
No additional details were provided.

~~~
yardstick
I’m skeptical it’s a group because no one has claimed responsibility- what’s
the point causing all this chaos if you won’t at least do an anonymous post
claiming it’s due to <xyz> issues.

My money is on disgruntled locals (individuals, not group) fed up with the
noise, or an individual that feels hard done by / aggrieved by either the
airport or an airline.

~~~
dazc
Recent plans to expand capacity may explain this?

[https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/18/gatwick-
plan...](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/oct/18/gatwick-plans-using-
emergency-runway-to-increase-flight-capacity)

~~~
CydeWeys
My money's on this. No one wants to live next to a major airport what with all
the flight noise and reduction in property values.

------
singularity2001
it would probably take too long to fly in the drone catching eagle:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5DEg2qZzkU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5DEg2qZzkU)

[https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/01/watch-this-trained-
eagle-t...](https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/01/watch-this-trained-eagle-take-
down-a-flying-drone/)

------
i_am_proteus
I'm not saying this would have worked at Gatwick because I was not on the
ground there, but GPS can be "spoofed" locally for specific vehicles.

[http://www.engr.utexas.edu/features/humphreysspoofing](http://www.engr.utexas.edu/features/humphreysspoofing)

------
tyingq
I wonder if you could train kamakazi birds with a tangling net trailing behind
them.

~~~
slig
There are some videos of hawks being trained to hit drones.

------
dharma1
So which drone was it? 3D Robotics?

~~~
konraditurbe
Either a hacked off the shelf drone or a custom built one

------
josefresco
Surprised they didn't bust out the Eagle Anti-Drone system:
[https://www.popsci.com/dutch-anti-drone-police-eagles-
ready-...](https://www.popsci.com/dutch-anti-drone-police-eagles-ready-for-
duty)

Yes ... Eagles as in the bird.w

Obligatory: [https://xkcd.com/1842/](https://xkcd.com/1842/)

------
buboard
couldn't they just shoot them down?

~~~
justtopost
Yes, but guns are loud and scary.

Its all pretty wacky. It seems they wanted it to continue or something. Even
the british military isn't this inept. They themselves demoed a drone weapon
just months ago, but where was it? This has to be a huge black eye to everyone
involved.

~~~
buboard
it would make sense to delay nuking it for 1-2 hours, but an entire day is
rather unacceptable.

------
abledon
how would they track who flew the drones? I guess UK camera network is paying
off?

~~~
IshKebab
Yeah because there are loads of CCTV cameras pointing at the sky...

The "UK camera network" is a bit of a myth by the way. Yes there are cameras,
but not a gazillion per person as normally claimed, and the vast majority of
them a privately owned cameras that the police do not have easy access to.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_Uni...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_surveillance_in_the_United_Kingdom#Number_of_cameras)

~~~
Havoc
>Yeah because there are loads of CCTV cameras pointing at the sky...

At an airport? I'd hope so...

~~~
jimnotgym
Really? I think the vast majority of crime around airports is from people
arriving and leaving via the normal land based access.

------
rurban
Reminds me on the current Icelandic movie "Woman at war", out now in the
cinemas. Maybe it's related.

------
seddin
Was this the guy that posted the image on Reddit ?

~~~
wishinghand
I’m pretty sure that was a joke post in reference to the incident.

~~~
rikkus
I’m pretty sure that you replied to a joke referencing that joke.

------
baybal2
[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2018/623/made](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2018/623/made)

------
baybal2
In UK, nobody can legally fly an RC plane without a permission of nobody other
than a Chief of Defence Staff himself...

Yet, all and everybody who fly drones recreationally don'y even know of the
regulation.

> Prior to apply for operation approval via Form CAA/AS/017, you are required
> to obtain the Security Clearance from the Office of the Chief of Defence
> Staff (OCDS) for the Operation of the Drone using below Fax or e-mail.

~~~
NeedMoreTea
Hardly surprising no one in the UK knows of this when you quote from CAA Sri
Lanka regulations.

[https://www.caa.lk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article...](https://www.caa.lk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=731)

~~~
baybal2
Facepalm, that's the wrong quote. But I am sure there is a similar regulation
in UK that effectively bars all RC toys from flying without a license that was
introduced around seventies.

I did a number of drone projects, and legals were quite sure that UK had a
mandatory drone registration.

~~~
barnabee
Nope.

RC aircraft are fine and have very clear laws
[https://www.caa.co.uk/Consumers/Unmanned-aircraft/Model-
airc...](https://www.caa.co.uk/Consumers/Unmanned-aircraft/Model-aircraft/)

As do drones, which have been updated fairly recently and only require a
license (for now at least…) for large drones or commercial usage
[https://www.caa.co.uk/Consumers/Unmanned-aircraft-and-
drones...](https://www.caa.co.uk/Consumers/Unmanned-aircraft-and-drones/)

~~~
baybal2
Well, thanks for correcting me on that if that's the case. If you work within
the field, you surely have a more up to date idea how that works.

