New York City will restrict drone flights over critical infrastructure

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) plans to restrict flights of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) over critical infrastructure in New York State. This was reported by Reuters on December 20, citing the state governor Kathy Hokul.

"The FAA plans to impose temporary restrictions on flights over certain critical infrastructure facilities in New York," Hokul noted.

According to her, the imposition of this restriction is necessary for precautionary measures. Hokul also added that no threats to public and national security have been identified. She called on Congress to approve a bill that would give states and law enforcement agencies the authority to implement measures to ban UAV flights.

Earlier, December 17, it was reported that in the U.S. state of California over the U.S. Marine Corps base were spotted unknown UAVs. It is noted that from December 9 to 15, six cases of violation of the airspace of the Marine Corps base "Camp Pendleton" were recorded.

December 14, a representative of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said that the U.S. authorities have not yet found confirmation that unidentified drones may pose a threat. The agency also noted that officials from the Department of Homeland Security, along with the FBI and New Jersey police, continue to investigate to determine whether the unidentified drones are indeed drones or are of a different nature.

Prior to that, on December 13, US President-elect Donald Trump accused the White House of withholding information about drones over the states and called for them to be shot down. Meanwhile, US Congressman Josh Gottheimer accused the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) of withholding information about drones in the sky over New York. At that time, it also became known about an unknown drone that flew several times over a US Navy weapons depot in the state of New Jersey. When exactly the drones were spotted, it is not reported.

About unknown drones over New Jersey became known on December 11. At that time, New Jersey Senator John Bramnick called for a state of emergency to ban the use of drones in response to numerous reports of unknown aircraft spotted in recent weeks.