The Biden administration is still struggling to offer a coherent response to concerns about drone sightings that have cropped up across the Northeast.
For days, the president’s appointees kept silent as buzz about alleged mystery drones escalated. Then they offered vague assurances that whatever the lights in the sky are, there is no sign that they are dangerous or operating illegally — and that many aren’t drones at all, but rather just planes and helicopters.
Most recently, White House national security communications adviser John Kirby floated the idea of creating a commission to study “congestion” in America’s skies. But people familiar with the U.S. aviation system say they can’t figure out what that proposal means, or how it would address people’s worries about what’s hovering around their homes.
All the while, concerns about the mystery sightings have continued to proliferate on social media and in news reports, including among law enforcement and elected officials, in what has become a burgeoning public relations fiasco for the waning Biden administration. It’s also provided plenty of opportunities for embarrassment for some of the people who have reported seeing the drones — such as former Republican Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, who has faced accusations that he was spooked by the constellation Orion.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), speaking Tuesday on “The Hugh Hewitt Show,” said lawmakers are equally in the dark and criticized the Biden administration’s response.
“We have received briefings — although you might put air quotes around briefings,” he said. “The administration cannot tell us where these aircraft are originating, what they’re doing, whether they pose a threat or who in the government is responsible for taking them down.”
Rep. Pat Ryan (D-N.Y.), called an unclassified briefing for lawmakers representing New York and New Jersey he received “fucking infuriating.”
“No urgency. no transparency. I was providing details to them from my own folks on the ground at Stewart [Air National Guard Base], which was shut down for almost two hours,” Ryan said Tuesday, referring to an incident at the military base last week.
Speaking on Hewitt’s show, Cotton concurred: “It’s almost comical, some of the stories we hear. For instance, base commanders sending pilots out on the flight line with flashlights to try to identify them,” he said.
A drone industry executive, granted anonymity to discuss how the FAA manages the skies, said the incidents are a troubling showcase of the “lack of airspace awareness,” coupled with just how challenging the problem of how to integrate drones into the airspace has become over the last several years.
Kirby offered the blue-ribbon panel option on Monday, saying that when Congress returns in January the White House will “be calling on them to put in place a bipartisan [commission] to examine congestion in the skies and to help set appropriate rules to address the public’s concerns.”
But when asked for more details on what the commission would examine, a National Security Council spokesperson referred questions to the Federal Aviation Administration. In a call with reporters on Tuesday, a senior FAA official, granted anonymity to discuss the issue, referred questions back to the NSC after stating that the agency is “clearly committed to safely integrating drones into the [national airspace].”
Of course, portions of America’s skies, especially around major metropolitan areas like New York City, are indeed congested. But typically drones don’t share airspace with airplanes or other aircraft that are under the direction of air traffic controllers, leaving many industry observers scratching their heads about just what congestion the White House wants to tackle.
The drone industry executive said it is “rare” for planes, helicopters and drones to share airspace. Planes typically operate under the direction of air traffic control, which kicks in at about 400 feet above the ground. Most drones don’t go above that threshold, so they don’t enter controlled airspace.
Some types of aircraft habitually operate below the 400-foot threshold — think law enforcement and medical helicopters — and those types of flights could conflict with drones.
Bailey Wood, a spokesperson for Vertical Aviation International, a trade group that represents helicopter operators among others, said though air traffic control isn’t responsible for directing flights below 400 feet, that doesn’t mean the area is “free of complexity.”
“The increasing presence of drones highlights the critical importance of emphasizing safe operations in this already congested airspace. We would like to emphasize that minimizing this complexity risks overlooking vital safety considerations and operational challenges faced by the vertical aviation industry,” Wood said.
The drone industry executive noted that in those areas, there is a shared responsibility for pilots to detect and avoid one another. In addition, the FAA requires all drone pilots to maintain visual contact with their craft, or for another type of detection equipment to be in place. He said more investments in those kinds of technologies could be part of a commission’s work.
But it’s unclear if that’s actually what Kirby meant.
Questions about the scope of the proposed commission aside, the drone episode has raised awareness of the relatively sparse authority that exists to deal with errant drones — currently, only the Department of Homeland Security and Justice Department can interdict them, and in limited cases.
Over the weekend, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer threw his support behind a bill, S. 1631, that would expand those counterdrone authorities, including to state or local law enforcement agencies that have the right approvals in place.
But bigger bills on which that one could hitch a ride, such as a major defense authorization bill or a bill to fund the government, are already moving through Congress. That means the bill will likely die at the end of the year and need to be reintroduced.
Waiting in the wings is a rule that would also dictate how drones should behave and where they can fly without visual observers for longer distances — which the industry has wanted for years to hasten how drones could be used across the U.S. (Currently, FAA approves waivers for these flights on a case-by-case basis).
“We don’t need to study this further,” the executive added, saying that the beyond-visual-line-of-sight rule needs to “move forward.”
“If drone operations were normalized, we wouldn’t be having this conversation about New Jersey,” the executive said.
On how to best respond to the hysteria, the senior FAA official on Tuesday reiterated that ongoing transparency and increasing the public’s understanding of “what’s out there” may tamp down some resident’s concerns, as well as what the FAA sets rules for.
“It’s an interagency effort for all of us to just keep talking about what we’re seeing,” the FAA official said.
— Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.