‘Unauthorized Drone Activity’ Closes DXB for More Than an Hour

[Correction 6/14: FlyerTalk previously reported Dubai International Airport code as DBX. It has been corrected to DXB.]

Thousands of international passengers had their travel plans disrupted on Saturday after reports of rogue drone activity forced the airport to close its runways for over an hour.

The 69-minute shutdown at Dubai International Airport (DXB) caused lasting headaches for thousands of passengers on Saturday. Airport officials say that 22 flights in all were diverted to Al Maktoum Dubai World Central International Airport (DWC) and dozens more flights were delayed because of the sudden and unexpected closure.

Authorities made the unusual decision to close all of the airport’s runways from 11:36 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. local time after at least one unmanned civil aircraft violated the restricted airspace near the airport. In the United Arab Emirates (UAE), unmanned civil drones are prohibited from flying within three miles of other aircraft; likewise, remote-controlled aircraft are subject to a three-mile no-fly zone surrounding airports, heliports and private landing strips.

“This is a very serious incident and we obviously take the safety of our customers and our staff extremely seriously,” Dubai Airport CEO Paul Griffiths told a local radio station in comments reported by Reuters. “As you can imagine, this is the busiest international airport in the world and there was major inconvenience to thousands of passengers … There are very clear restrictions and no fly zones around all airports in the UAE, saying that this type of activity is actually illegal.”

Officials in the Gulf nation have a history of reacting forcefully to any perceived outside threat to aviation. In March of 2015, three British plane spotters were arrested and jailed in the UAE after drawing the attention of an off-duty policeman near Fujairah International Airport (FJR). The aviation enthusiasts, who were reportedly on public property at the time they were detained, had been excited to catch a glimpse of and get photographs of the seldom-seen vintage aircraft known to use the airport. The hobbyists instead found themselves in a jail cell on “grounds of national security.”

[Photo: AP]