BENGALURU: Amid all the chaos about an unidentified drone at Gatwick airport in London disrupting traffic, HAL airport in Bengaluru faced something similar when a complaint filed by the Helicopter division of HAL led to the detention of two people who are accused of illegally flying a drone equipped with a camera, to shoot a film of a nearby real estate project. The incident took place on December 15.
HAL police detained Syed, 24, and Bharath, 28, both residents of Whitefield, and employed with a private advertising firm.
According to police, Krishna Naik, chief manager of the Helicopter division of HAL, filed a complaint on Thursday, informing police that a ‘Rudra’ helicopter, the armed version of HAL Dhruv chopper, was being piloted by Hari Nair, an experimental test pilot with HAL, on December 12 for testing when around 1.30pm, the drone showed up on the radar of the chopper in the premises surrounding HAL. The complainant goes on to say that this unauthorised flying of a drone could have posed a threat to the safety of the mission as well as the pilot.
Police added that they were interrogating the duo while also taking the assistance of experts to understand what the drone was recording. They registered a case against the accused.