Scotland Yard Still Thinks Airliner Hit A UAV On Approach To The Airport

While U.K. Transportation Minister Robert Goodwill has played down the meme that an airliner on approach to Heathrow Airport hit a UAV last week, others are not convinced that it was possibly a plastic bag, as the Minister suggested to Parliament on Thursday.

On Friday, Scotland Yard officials told the U.K. newspaper The Standard that they still believe the aircraft hit a drone, and their investigation is ongoing.

While the airport and the National Police Chief's Council are playing their anti-drone measures close to the vest, the paper reports that the U.K. government has tested a counter-UAV system that uses technology employed in Afghanistan that jams the UAVs radio signals and brings it down ... a "drone death ray", for lack of a better term.

In trials conducted last summer, the system that would cost "under a million pounds" according to the three British companies developing it tracks heat from a UAVs battery, zeros in on the aircraft with a very powerful camera, and then blocks the signals between the operator and the aircraft before tracing down drone's owner. The CEO of Blighter Surveillance Systems, one of the companies involved in the development of the "death ray", says it allows authorities to take control of the aircraft rather than just send it plunging to the ground.

The UAV industry is developing geofencing software that would keep drones away from airports, and aircraft manufacturers are being asked to determine the amount of damage a UAV could cause should it impact an aircraft or be sucked into an engine, according to the report.

(Image from file)

FMI: http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/geofencing