Gov. Kathy Hochul calls for passage of federal drone legislation, amid more sightings on Long Island and at Stewart International Airport

Gov. Kathy Hochul on Saturday called for the passage of federal legislation that would allow law enforcement agencies to intercept and destroy drones after Stewart International Airport closed for an hour over a sighting of one of the aerial devices.

“This has gone too far,” the governor said in a statement.

Over the past month, a flurry of reported nighttime drone sightings in New York and New Jersey has alarmed the public and sparked a range of theories over their purpose and who is flying them. Nassau County police said Saturday that the department had received 55 reports of drone sightings since Friday, and 79 since Nov. 1. Suffolk County police said they had received more than a dozen reports of drone sightings on Thursday.

The FBI and federal Department of Homeland Security, in response to the sightings in New Jersey, issued a statement Thursday saying the objects did not "pose a national security or public safety threat" and that many appeared to be "manned aircraft, operating lawfully."

President-elect Donald Trump on social media Friday criticized federal authorities for not providing better information on the phenomena and called for the unidentified objects to be shot down. 

Airport closed

On Friday, Stewart International Airport, which is run by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, halted takeoffs and landings between 9:40 p.m. and 10:45 p.m. after a drone sighting. There was no impact on operations at the upstate New Windsor airport, according to a spokeswoman.

Hochul said in her statement that last month she had asked the New York State Police’s Intelligence Center to investigate the drone sightings and work with the FBI and federal Department of Homeland Security.

“But in order to allow state law enforcement to work on this issue, I am now calling on Congress to pass the Counter-UAS Authority Security, Safety and Reauthorization Act,” she said Saturday, using the acronym for unmanned aircraft systems.

Hochul said the bill would "strengthen" the Federal Aviation Administration's oversight of drones and would allow "select" state and local law enforcement agencies to get involved in policing them.

 New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy has also advocated for the bill's passage.

Hochul also called on President Joe Biden's administration to increase the number of federal law enforcement agents assigned to New York and New Jersey to “ensure the safety of our critical infrastructure and our people.” 

Under the bill, federal law enforcement would work with the FAA to “disrupt control of, disable, damage or destroy an unmanned aircraft or unmanned aircraft system, including by means of intercept or other access of a wire, oral or electronic communication used to control the unmanned aircraft or unmanned aircraft system.”

Collision concerns

Currently, the Code of Federal Regulations Part 107 outlines the rules for piloting a drone. Among those rules is that drone flight is prohibited around airports. Operators have to pass an FAA test to obtain a license to legally fly the aircraft and the maximum altitude allowed for most drones is 400 feet. Flying a drone at night requires completion of a training program.

“The biggest issue for me is safety,” said Michael Canders, associate aviation professor at Farmingdale State College. “Having a number of these things in very busy airspace, particularly the area around JFK, LaGuardia, Islip [and] Republic, there’s a lot of manned aircraft in the air and my concern is the potential for a collision between these unmanned ones and airliners and private aircraft.”

Canders called on the public to report drone flights in these areas to the FAA.

“I hope that people can adopt the mentality of, ‘If you see something, say something,’ ” he said. “If there's some knowledge of who is operating these things, it's really important to disclose that to the proper officials so that it can be stopped.”

Canders said that Farmingdale State College offers a course in drone operation to help pilots become educated and licensed in flying them. 

The professor, who said he is licensed to fly drones and manned aircraft, cautioned against taking up Trump's suggestion to shoot down the objects.

“Some of these are very large,” he said. “So as they come out of the sky, when they land, they present a hazard.”

'You just wonder for now'

Nassau Police Det. Lt. Scott E. Skrynecki said in a statement that reports of drone sightings had "increased significantly over the past few days due to public awareness of the activity in New Jersey."

Unlike New Jersey, though, he said the reports in Nassau County had been for "objects similar to personally-owned recreational drones."

He added, "We will continue to monitor the reporting and as always we are communicating with our partners in federal, state and local law enforcement."

Bill Walker, 52, who lives near Jones Beach, said he was drawn out of bed by three drones flying about 200 feet over his home around 11 p.m. Friday. He said that they were about half the size of a small yellow school bus.

“I know what a helicopter sounds like. And it sounds different. It sounded more like a wishy-wishy-wishy than a chop-a-chop-a,” Walker said. “It was just like a different kind of sound.”

Walker, who sent Newsday a video recording of one of the drones, said that the three aircraft had blinking lights and seemed to be traveling together.

He said that he had no theories for what the aircraft were doing and they didn’t frighten him.

“You just wonder for now,” he said. “Everything is a conspiracy theory until a year or two later, then it turns out that half of it is true.”