The National Park Service announced on Friday that it has ordered a ban on the use of drones in the 401 National Parks in the U.S. to provide a better experience for visitors and wildlife.
The park service said the automated machines annoy visitors, harass wildlife and threaten safety, according to ABC News reported. The parks account for 84 million acres of public land and waterways.
Jonathan Jarvis, director of the National Park Service, said he would sign a policy memorandum on Friday that would direct superintendents of the parks to write rules banning people from launching, landing and operating drones in the parks.
The park service said the policy memo is a temporary measure until Jarvis proposes a federal regulation about the automated aircraft, The Wall Street Journal reported. It added that current regulations give the service the authority to ban drones.
Officials at Yosemite National Park in California announced in May they would adopt a policy to ban drones. Officials in Zion, Utah established a ban on the aircraft after an incident in which a drone was found harassing bighorn sheep and causing younger sheep to become separated from their herd. Park rangers at Mount Rushmore in South Dakota confiscated a drone last September after it flew above 1,500 visitors sitting in an amphitheater, then over the heads of the four presidents on the mountain, ABC News reported.
"Imagine you're a big wall climber in Yosemite working on a four-day climb up El Capitan, and you're hanging off a bolt ready to make a (difficult) move, and an unmanned aircraft flies up beside you and is hovering a few feet from your head with its GoPro camera running," Jarvis said in an interview. "Think about what that does to your experience and your safety."
Under the memorandum, drone hobbyists and clubs that already have approval to operate the technology in some parks can still operate the aircraft, ABC News reported. Jarvis said parks will still be able to grant permits to people to use drones for research, search and rescue, firefighting, and other purposes. He added that filmmakers and other commercial operators can apply for a permit to fly drones.
"We would have to hear why they would necessarily need this type of equipment in order to accomplish their goals," Jarvis said.
