SALT LAKE CITY — Utah lawmakers on Wednesday will consider allowing officials to damage or disable unauthorized drones flying over a wildfire and impose higher fines on people caught flying the aircraft.
The proposal is one of a handful of bills legislators will vote on when they meet in a special legislative session in the afternoon.
The harsher drone penalties were added to the expected special session after a drone was spotted five times over a southwestern Utah wildfire, forcing firefighters to ground their aircraft and delay their work.
The bill would allow a government official in charge of the firefighters to neutralize a drone by disabling it or damaging it.
It does not appear that any state currently allows a drone to be disabled specifically for flying over a wildfire. But Louisiana has a law allowing police or firefighters to disable a drone if it endangers the public or an officer, said Amanda Essex, who researches state unmanned aircraft policies for the National Conference of State Legislatures.
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A handful of states, including Utah, have laws making it a crime to fly a drone that interferes with manned aircraft or firefighting operations. Those laws could be used to charge someone flying near wildfires or interfering with firefighters using tankers, helicopters and other manned aircraft.
Earlier this year, Utah lawmakers considering allowing law enforcement to shoot down drones that interfere with emergency workers, but they backed away from the idea. Other states have proposed shooting down drones, but it hasn't become law, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Utah instead passed a law earlier this year making it a crime to fly the unmanned aircraft near a wildfire. The penalties involved fines of up to $2,500 and jail time if a drone flying near a fire stops aircraft from flying or dropping water or retardant. If a drone actually collided with an aircraft or caused it to crash, the drone pilot could face up to 15 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.
Under the legislation they're voting on Wednesday, those fines would all be higher, with the maximum fine at $15,000.
The law would also allow courts to make a drone pilot pay damages.
Gov. Gary Herbert, a Republican, said Wednesday that the costs of fighting a small wildfire burning about 300 miles south of Salt Lake City would have been several million dollars if five drone flights hadn't interfered. "Now we're way past, north of $10 million because we had to ground aircraft all because of a drone," Herbert said.
The Washington County Sheriff's Office has been investigating drones flying near the fire, which is burning on a rocky ridge above the town of Pine Valley, but no arrests have been made or suspects identified. The sheriff's office has offered a $1,000 reward for information that leads to an arrest.
Utah's Legislature on Wednesday will also look at spending $10 million toward a new stadium at the state fairgrounds and approving tax exemptions for a data center as part of an attempt to lure Facebook.
Documents filed with utility regulators show the social media giant is looking at building a new data center in Utah or New Mexico.
Other bills they'll vote on would allow probation or parole officers to access a database of prescription drug users and allow grandparents to get legal visiting rights to grandchildren adopted by family members. Herbert vetoed a version of the bill earlier this year, but he said he'd approve it if changes were made to put limits on when and how often grandparents may seek court orders.
