Extinction Rebellion are threatening to shut down Heathrow Airport with drones
 

Irresponsible and downright dangerous.

As the "activists" say, "nuff said".

well arrest them all and fine them £50k each, that'll stop them

They can only shut down Heathrow if Heathrow can't deal with drones. If Heathrow can't deal with drones by now then I'd say there are more serious questions to be asked.

It's not that there has been no previous disruption at British airports with drone issues after the Gatwick episode last December.

I think the authorities are going to act robustly over this. If they don't and there's further chaos, heads should roll.

And meanwhile you're all happy for everyone to keep driving the human race to extinction?

As quoted by PropPax "nuff said".

A third runway at Heathrow will not end humanity

And that's the problem with the British approach - heads should roll. And it leads to quick, "decisive" but utterly useless "action". When it happened at Gatwick, the government "decisively" responded with a larger exclusion zone, a decision much praised by the British pilots union leaders. But how exactly did it improve the situation or reduced the risks? The answer is - it didn't.

In sight of that "measure", I predict the likely course of action for Heathrow:

1. Criminalize the sales of drones.
2. "Combat the illegal practice of unlicensed drone sales".
3. "Allocate additional funds to combat the illegal practice of unlicensed drone sales".
4. Create the Illegal Drone Sales Monitoring Board which will have the authority to close the M4, except the bus lane.
5. Create the Parliamentary Committee on Illegal Drone Activity
6. Blame the Labour.
7. Nigel Farage And Boris Johnson will submit a motion to forbid immigration from the drone-producing countries.

The end result, however, will be "nought".

Yes, irresponsible and, if Heathrow continued operations regardless (highly unlikely), then potentially dangerous.

Having said that, Heathrow's protestations that it takes climate change seriously

would carry rather more weight if the airport wasn't simultaneously fudging the statistics that it publishes on the environmental performance of airlines at LHR, such that they are regularly awarded impossibly high "Fly Quiet & Green" scores of around 40% more, on average, than their performance actually merits under Heathrow's own rules.

I just hope somebody is tracking down Extinction Rebellion's bank accounts and the main leader's assets so that they can be frozen and hopefully seized in the event they go ahead with these criminal and reckless actions.

This is true, and neither, in itself, will, for example, Australia generating most of its electricty from very dirty coal. And at my (and I suspect your) age, being selfish, we really don't need to care. But for people who hope still to be alive in 60 or 70 years time these things are very important. I get that. And I hope more of our generation will soon.

One has to be very careful of statistics, but, from what I read, the UK has reduced its carbon footprint by over 30% since 1990. These people would do better to praise the UK's record and direct their efforts towards China. But that would be futile, wouldn't it!

At your age you should probably remember the 70s hysteria about "global cooling". Remember all the fuss that our planet will succumb to the -273C that surrounds us in the outer space? The only difference now is that ideas get spread easier and farther on Internet.

It takes infinitely less courage to attack Heathrow with drones than to stand in front of a tank in Beijing. My generation calls it "the path of least resistance".

Hear hear
 

Only vaguely. But no, the difference now is progress in scientific understanding.

I believe in science. Do you?

It's possible to love aviation and at the same time realise that we cannot continue expanding.

This is the problem:

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....f1ba5f4842.jpg
(source: NASA)

Aviation is fun, challenging, mind broadening, brings cultures together, etc. But most of it is non-essential. What do we need a third runway for? To free up 27L and R so more people can go to Thailand for 2 weeks?

It's pretty clear that we're facing a serious climate problem. We've known about this since the 70s and b***er all's been done really. Yes we've done a few things on power generation. But transport? All we've seen is more cars, more planes. So although I don't think shutting down Heathrow with drones is a good idea, you can see where they're coming from, because no other form of protest seems to be working.