A man has been fined after being convicted of drink-driving a drone in Sweden.
It is understood to be the first case in the country of a drone operator being prosecuted and convicted of being drunk.
Few countries have outlawed being drunk while in charge of a drone, but Japan did so in 2019.
Police flying their own device to monitor a classic car event in Rättvik, a town in central Sweden, spotted another drone in the temporary no-fly zone, The Guardian reported.
Officers tracked down the person controlling the drone, and tests found his bloodstream contained 0.69 parts of alcohol for every 1,000 parts of blood – 0.069 per cent.
Under Swedish law, the blood alcohol limit is 0.02 per cent, which is strict compared with other parts of Europe. In the UK, the limit is 0.08 per cent; in Spain, France and Belgium it is 0.05 per cent. In Romania and Hungary it is 0.
The 55-year-old man later denied flying the drone under the influence of alcohol, blaming a friend who was not there when police arrived.
But he was found guilty and fined 32,000 SEK (£2,335) to be paid across 80 days in daily fines of 400 SEK (£29).
“I have not seen a case like this before,” prosecutor Jenny Holden Nyström told broadcaster SVT. “I am satisfied with the verdict.”
Karin Hellmont, the district court president, said it applied the same punishment scale as it would for drink-driving.
“It is an aircraft. Even though it is flown by itself, it is controlled by someone down on the ground and can fall from a high height and injure someone,” she said.
