Unidentified drones at four Danish Airports halt flights, spark police probe

Drones sighted at four regional airports in western Denmark disrupted traffic and sparked a large police operation two days after the Nordic country’s main hub was hit by a similar incident.

Air traffic at the airport in Aalborg, Denmark’s third-largest, was suspended late Wednesday while drones also were spotted at three smaller airfields, police said. Authorities have now started an “intense investigation,” together with Denmark’s armed forces and the intelligence agency, according to a police statement. 

The events follow Monday’s four-hour shutdown of Copenhagen airport, Scandinavia’s busiest, which police said was carried out by a “capable actor” and which Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen described as a  “serious attack” on Danish critical infrastructure. 

The incidents are the latest to show the vulnerability transport hubs face to outside interference. A cyberattack on a key airline check-in system snarled travel at major European airports over the weekend, forcing staff to process passengers manually, triggering delays and cancellations. 

The drones at Aalborg disappeared shortly before 1 a.m. local time on Thursday, after circling around the airport for more than three hours, police said. The drones were large and police said they’d ruled out the possibility they may have been hobby drones operated by private individuals.

A spokesman for the airport told local broadcaster DR that the shutdown of the airspace had led to the diversion of four flights. The smaller airports didn’t have any scheduled flights overnight, police said.