Drone-detection with Bournemouth 7s & Houndstooth Wireless

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2017

Presenting on the Festival & Future Stage at this year’s Event Tech Live was Craig Mathie, the MD at Bournemouth 7s, Paul Ashurst, the events director at Bournemouth 7s and Suja Kerr, the director of strategic partnerships at Houndstooth Wireless.

The three speakers used their time to describe drones at events and why organisers may need to be mindful of them, particularly at outdoor events such as festivals, carnivals and fairs.

Drones may pose security, safety and privacy threats with either accidental or malicious intent. For example, if drones aren’t operated properly or they lose power, they will literally fall from the sky. This can cause injury or damage to any audience members of property unlucky enough to be directly below it.

Additionally, drones may be used for smuggling items in or out of the event: stolen items and wristbands could easily be smuggled out and illegal items such as drugs and weapons could be smuggled in.

To add to the list of drone misuses, plenty of drones have cameras attached and can, therefore, be used for unauthorised filming. This poses privacy and infringement issues.

Furthermore, operating drones in certain places is illegal and can result in a hefty fine and/or prison sentence. One of these places is near airport runways. Being situated directly next to Bournemouth Airport, Bournemouth 7s cannot tolerate unauthorised drone-usage.

Technology is available that can identify unauthorised drones and their controllers, allowing organisers or security to approach the users and stop the drones. Plenty of times, the drone-user is unaware they are breaking any rules and it will be down to the organiser’s discretion as to how to handle the situation from there.

Event Tech Live is Europe’s biggest show dedicated to event technology. Completely free to attend, it is returning in 2020 to The Old Truman Brewery on 4th-5th November.

This footage was kindly captured by our friends at First Sight Media.

Molly Hookings
Author: Molly Hookings

Molly joined the editorial team in March 2019. She has several years’ experience working in broadcast and journalism, as well as marketing and PR. Past experience includes working for the BBC and independent publishing houses. If you have a story you think Molly might be interested in, please email: molly@eventindustrynews.com