UK imposes restrictions on drone operations over prisons in England and Wales

Effective from January 25, 2024, a statutory instrument will be enacted to impose restrictions on the operation of uncrewed aircraft in the airspace above 98 prisons and young offender institutions in England and Wales (excluding Scotland). The Secretary of State has deemed it necessary to implement these measures due to concerns related to security and public safety within these areas.

The statutory instrument has been published under ‘The Air Navigation (Restriction of Flying) (Prisons and Young Offender Institutions) (England and Wales) Regulations 2023’ and comes under Civil Aviation 2023 No. 1101.

In UK law, a statutory instrument is a legislative tool that enables the provisions of a previously enacted Act of Parliament to be implemented or modified without the necessity of passing a new Act through Parliament.

The document outlining this statutory instrument provides intricate details about the spatial boundaries of the affected airspace and the specific nature of the imposed restrictions.  Aerial Defence has designed a simplified version to facilitate tasks such as defining alerting zones in a CUAS system. The full statutory instrument is available to view on the legislation.gov.uk website or a .pdf version is available here <download pdf>.

(Image: Aerial Defence)