Image credit – NYPD
The New Year’s Eve ball drop in New York City’s Times Square is perhaps the biggest gathering in the world where people wait to ring in the new year. As one can probably imagine, providing security for an event of this size is a mammoth task in and of itself. The New York Police Department works with other law enforcement partners to ensure that people can enjoy the festivities safely. Drones will be a part of its security measures for New Year’s Eve for the first time.
Deputy Commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism John Miller said this week that drones will be used alongside other technology and measures to ensure foolproof security for the ball drop. More than 1,200 portable and stationary cameras will be used to keep an eye on the crowds as well.
“We’ll be deploying NYPD drones for overwatch. We haven’t done that before, but that’s going to give us a visual aid and a flexibility of being able to move a camera to a certain spot with great rapidity through a tremendous crowd,” he said.
The New York Post mentions that at least one of the drones will be tethered at the top of a building in order to prevent potential attacks. This precaution will also serve to protect the crowd below in case there’s a malfunction.
This technology be deployed to back up the thousands of NYPD officers that will be on duty come December 31st. Police Commissioner James P. O’Neill said that nobody at the event “will be more than 10 feet away from a uniformed or undercover plain clothes officer.”