Jockey Club step up efforts to crackdown on drones at the Cheltenham Festival

Moves to clamp down on the flying of drones will be rolled out at next month’s Cheltenham Festival. Racemail understands the Jockey Club, owners of Cheltenham, have recruited specialist firm Crowded Space to step up efforts to block drones being flown near racecourses. The Jockey Club have stepped up efforts to block drones being flown near racecourses While the operation will not physically take down rogue drones, the technology employed by Crowded Space can detect when the pilot of a drone has broken any regulations, like flying too low or too close to public exclusion zones. Racemail revealed last month that drones mounted with cameras were being flown on British racecourses, with pictures used by punters who bet on races in-running so that they could get an edge over punters using conventional TV feeds. Explaining their work on their website, Crowded Space say: ‘Using the latest technology for detection, our teams stopped over 200 illegal drone flights at major events in 2018 with many arrests and prosecutions.’ News that exclusions zones for the flying of drones around airports will be extended to three miles from March 13 — the second day of the Festival — will also be welcomed by Cheltenham.