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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/19/gatwick-flights-halted-after-drone-sighting
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| Version 9 | Version 10 |
|---|---|
| Gatwick flights suspended after reports of drones over runway | Gatwick flights suspended after reports of drones over runway |
| (about 1 hour later) | |
| Gatwick airport remains closed after another sighting of drones over the runway, causing disruption to thousands of passengers that is likely to last at least another 24 hours. | Gatwick airport remains closed after another sighting of drones over the runway, causing disruption to thousands of passengers that is likely to last at least another 24 hours. |
| Passengers arriving at the airport were informed that flights would remain suspended until 11am at the earliest. Police were still attempting to bring the drones down on Thursday morning, 13 hours after they first appeared. | |
| How dangerous are drones to aircraft? | |
| The transport minister, Elizabeth Sugg, said: “The police are working to bring the drone down, and I am confident that they will do so … Our priority is to get that airport open as safely as possible so that people can fly off on their Christmas breaks, or people who are coming in to visit friends and family.” | |
| She said the drone operators could face up to five years in jail. | |
| Chris Woodroofe, the airport’s chief operating officer, apologised to passengers and said the drones could not be shot down because of the risk of stray bullets. | |
| Officers from Surrey and Sussex police forces have been scouring the perimeter to try to catch the operators of two drones, which were first spotted at 9pm on Wednesday night, leading to flights being suspended. Sussex police said there was no indication that the ongoing incident was terror-related. | |
| Justin Burtenshaw, Gatwick airport’s policing commander who is in charge of trying to catch the operator(s) of the drones, told the BBC: “Each time we believe we get close to the operator the drone disappears when we look to reopen the airfield the drone reappears, so I’m absolutely convinced it is a deliberate act to disrupt Gatwick airport. | |
| “There has been no intelligence that this is going to happen. This is just a random act that has happened overnight. | |
| “I’m convinced we will [capture the operator(s)]. It is a painstaking thing. The bigger the drone the further the reach of the operator so it is a difficult and challenging thing to locate them. But I’ve got teams and investigators looking at how we do that and I’m confident we will.” | |
| The drones disappeared and reappeared over the runway area from 9am until 3am when the runway was reopened. But 45 minutes later they reappeared. | |
| Woodroofe said thousands of people had been affected by the disruption, which was expected to continue until at least Friday. | Woodroofe said thousands of people had been affected by the disruption, which was expected to continue until at least Friday. |
| “Last night there were 10,000 people disrupted,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme. | |
| He said: “There were 6,000 people flying in from around the world to Gatwick who were diverted to alternative airports. | |
| “There were 2,000 people who didn’t take off from their origin airport and there were a further 2,000 people here who couldn’t fly to their destination. | “There were 2,000 people who didn’t take off from their origin airport and there were a further 2,000 people here who couldn’t fly to their destination. |
| “My advice to passengers travelling today and tomorrow is to check their airlines’ websites before they travel to the airport. The knock-on effects will certainly last for 24 hours and it will be longer than that for every passenger to be repatriated.” | “My advice to passengers travelling today and tomorrow is to check their airlines’ websites before they travel to the airport. The knock-on effects will certainly last for 24 hours and it will be longer than that for every passenger to be repatriated.” |
| Some people reported being left stuck on aircraft for several hours while they waited to find out what was going on. Gatwick advised anyone flying from the airport, or collecting someone, to check the status of their flight. | |
| Arthur Serbejs, 22, and Domante Balciuniate, 21, factory workers from Hastings, sat on the floor by a prayer room, approaching their 16th hour of waiting for a flight to Barcelona. | |
| “We came about 6pm yesterday, and we’re going to be here until like 7pm,” Serbejs said. “At 9pm yesterday we were on the plane for four hours – they turned the lights off and everything like it was going to take off.” | |
| “But we were still sitting there,” Balciunate added. Serbejs said he had fallen asleep while the plane sat on the airport apron, hoping to wake up in Spain, “and I woke up and we hadn’t moved.” | |
| Eventually they were taken off the flight, and offered a hotel in Brighton, which they declined as they live close by. They were told they would get an email with a ticket for another flight, but none came. “We stood in line for three hours for a 30-second conversation saying ‘your flight has already been transferred hours ago’, but we didn’t know about it,” Serbejs said. | |
| “It’s crazy, it’s my worst airport experience.” | |
| “We don’t even expect to go to Barcelona any more,” Balciunate said. “Maybe there’s another drone up there – but we have hope. There’s a prayer room over there, we were thinking about going.” | |
| Mamosta Abdulla said he was on an Iraq-bound flight on Wednesday evening before getting stuck on the tarmac for four hours. He would miss his father’s memorial service, he said. | |
| “We got here at 6pm and should have flown at 9.10pm, but we were stuck four hours on the plane with a crying baby, the child was disabled and everyone was sweating because it was so hot in there,” he said. | |
| Passengers were given a voucher for food, he added, but were left to sleep “in a freezing place on uncomfortable chairs”. | |
| How have you been affected by the delay at Gatwick airport? | |
| “We are in Iraq with bombs going off nearby and the plane still lands. But here some drones have shut down the airport.” | |
| pic.twitter.com/RrdWpNk1kY | pic.twitter.com/RrdWpNk1kY |
| An airport spokeswoman said that airlines were working to provide affected passengers with hotel accommodation or transport for those whose flights were diverted. | |
| Luton, Heathrow, Stansted and Manchester were among the airports which accepted diverted flights. They were also sent as far as Amsterdam and Paris. | |
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| Transport | Transport |
| Drones (non-military) | Drones (non-military) |
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