Two middle-aged people were being held Saturday over the suspected "criminal use of drones" at London's Gatwick Airport, where flights were returning to normal after three days of pre-Christmas disruption affecting 140,000 passengers. Police swooped on a 47-year-old man and a 54-year-old woman from town of Crawley, which neighbours Britain's second-busiest airport.
A Gatwick spokesman said the airport planned to run a full schedule of 757 flights carrying 124,484 passengers on Saturday. But he warned that passengers should expect some delays and cancellations "as we continue to recover our operations".
"We are grateful for passengers' continued patience as we work to get them to their final destination in time for Christmas," the spokesman said. Drones were first sighted buzzing around Gatwick on Wednesday then reappeared more than 50 times, forcing the government to bring in specialist military resources to help counter the threat.
The dangers posed by drones include the possibility of a device smashing into a passenger plane or being sucked up into an engine where its highly flammable lithium battery could cause a catastrophe. The two people arrested late Friday were being held on suspicion of "disrupting services of civil aviation aerodrome to endanger or likely to endanger safety of operations or persons".
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