The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that there have been 187 drone sightings close to high-security navy institutions throughout the UK because the begin of 2025.
Responding to a parliamentary query from Plaid Cymru peer Lord Wigley, Defence Minister Lord Coaker stated the division wouldn’t disclose particulars of the places or countermeasures used however emphasised that safety was taken extraordinarily severely.
“We is not going to touch upon the sensitivity of institutions or our particular safety preparations in relation to figuring out and capturing drones,” Coaker stated. “Nonetheless, we will guarantee you that we take the security and safety of our personnel, property and operations extraordinarily severely. We keep multi-layered safety measures, together with counter-drone capabilities which might establish and facilitate the seize of drones.”
Final yr, a Freedom of Info investigation revealed dozens of such incidents at nuclear services between 2021 and 2023, starting from false alarms and authorised flights to unidentified drones that evaded detection.
That earlier knowledge confirmed that drone-related occasions occurred at nuclear energy stations, analysis centres, and defence websites together with the Atomic Weapons Institution at Aldermaston and Burghfield, in addition to bases related to the UK’s nuclear submarine fleet. Some claimed, however maybe unlikely, sightings have been as excessive as 20,000 toes, whereas others triggered safety alarms or prompted police searches that yielded no outcomes.
The widespread availability of economic drones, mixed with their rising vary and payload capability, continues to check current frameworks. Officers insist that measures are in place to detect and counter unauthorised drones, but the frequency of incidents underscores the issue of defending huge and diverse essential infrastructure in opposition to cheap, simply modified techniques able to gathering intelligence or disrupting operations.