REPORT: DRONE AND PLANE NEARLY COLLIDE

At a time when numerous news organizations are contesting an FAA ban on the use of camera-equipped drones for their coverage, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that a U.S. airliner nearly collided with a drone in March. The newspaper quoted a federal official as saying that a pilot of an American airlines Group Inc. regional jet reported that he came dangerously close to one of the small remotely-controlled devices about 2,300 feet over the Tallahassee Regional Airport on March 22. The official said that such an incident highlights the risks posed by the proliferation of unmanned aircraft. “The risk for a small [drone] to be ingested into a passenger airline engine is very real,” he said. It was not clear whether the drone, described “as a camouflaged F-4 fixed-wing aircraft that was quite small” was being used for commercial, military, or hobbyist purposes.