Planes grounded as drone enters pilot flightpath

Monday 24 June 2019

Planes had to temporarily be grounded at Jersey Airport over the weekend, after a pilot flying at 2,000feet was forced to take action to avoid a drone in his flight path.

The report came from a visiting light aircraft around four miles out from the airfield around 13:40 on Saturday, and led Air Traffic Control to immediately suspend all departures for commercial and private flights on the airport’s eastern runway while the Police and Honorary Officers investigated the area in Trinity where the drone was seen.

No further sightings were reported, leading flying to resume just under one hour later at 14:32.

Travel Update - departing flights at @JERairport suspended for short time this afternoon (Saturday) as precautionary measure following report of a drone flying in vicinity of airfield. Flying now resumed. Thank you to passengers affected by this for their patience & understanding

— Ports of Jersey (@PortsofJersey) June 22, 2019

Ports of Jersey have now submitted an incident report to the European Aviation Safety Agency.

The ports authority is also now urging local drone operators to brush up on the regulations, which state that drones should not be flown at more than 400feet and within two nautical miles of the airfield without permission from Air Traffic Control. 

A user guide can be downloaded from the airport website.

Pictured: All flights from the airport's easterly runway were suspended, although ATC did allow some aircraft to take off in a westerly direction. 

The news comes over six months after a drone sighting led to chaos at Gatwick Airport over the Christmas period.

Several flights heading to the major airport to and from Jersey were cancelled with further warnings of delays, threatening travel plans for hundreds hoping to get to the island – or leave it – over the Christmas break.