A Lantau-bound Sun Ferry vessel ran aground near Hei Ling Chau in the early hours of Monday, prompting an evacuation of passengers and crew.

A spokesperson for the Fire Service Department (FSD) told HKFP on Monday that 34 people were on board, including 29 passengers and five crew members. No injuries were reported.

The incident happened at around 12.55am on Monday, when the First Ferry VI vessel, sailing the Central to Mui Wo route, ran aground and collided into the Hei Ling Chau typhoon shelter breakwater.

A total of four FSD boats, two ambulances and 60 firefighters and ambulatory medics were deployed, the spokesperson said by phone.

A passenger who gave his name as Adam told HKFP that “all of a sudden, the ship rammed violently into something.”

He added, “The sound during the collision [was] frightening, and the deceleration was so sudden and aggressive that it threw me off the seat.”

He said that there was momentary panic among passengers, but things calmed down quickly as the crew came to check on them.

See also: Mui Wo-bound ferry caught in fishing net, stranded at sea for an hour

Passengers donned life jackets and were transported by rescue boat to Mui Wo, he said.

Five days after the incident, a spokesperson for Sun Ferry told HKFP that the captain responsible “is currently not on navigational duty and is on leave.” They added that an investigation was now underway.

Several times a day, a drone carrying high-capacity cameras and flashing red-and-blue lights whirs and rises from the rooftops of police stations across Hong Kong.

They emerge from a box-shaped docking system that slowly unfolds its doors to both sides. Some hover over the city’s billion-dollar villas with private pools and tennis courts; others whizz along streets bustling with people and traffic. 

Hong Kong police have been rapidly expanding their use of surveillance technology and automated drones. They have used drones to hunt down people who overstayed visas or gambled illegally.

According to the police force, these technologies will help deliver high-quality police services and optimise deployment and efficiency. Drones and cameras alike will also likely be combined with the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and facial recognition capabilities.

Drones will substitute some of the police’s foot patrols, and tens of thousands of surveillance cameras will be installed to assist in investigations and arrests. 

Since a drone patrol pilot scheme was rolled out in May last year, the technology has helped arrest 54 people, including at least six wanted individuals, according to police. The force did not provide complete data, but at least half of the suspects allegedly committed non-violent crimes.

In one operation last month that spanned from West Kowloon to Lantau Island, police – with the help of drones – arrested 19 people suspected of immigration infractions and prostitution. 

In another instance, police used drones to apprehend a group of eight middle-aged and elderly people who were gambling illegally in a public housing estate in Ma On Shan. Police also fined two drivers spotted crossing over into an oncoming traffic lane on a road to Shek O, using a drone. 

Police have not responded to HKFP’s request for more details on how the drones helped during those arrests and investigations. 

The increased use of drones is a response to China’s push for a “low-altitude economy,” which can be integrated into daily services ranging from deliveries to law enforcement, said Sky Yeung, chairperson of the DNT FPV Drone Association Hong Kong, China. 

Businesses such as delivery companies and government agencies can test drone-use scenarios through a regulatory exemption scheme, and the government is taking steps to prepare for more drones in the air, whether operated commercially or by authorities, Yeung said. 

So far, police have not explicitly said anything about using drones for national security purposes, which has been a priority for Hong Kong’s law enforcement in recent years.

However, as an expert told HKFP, the capability is there.

Despite the stated purpose of police technology, once the law allows for an agitator, a national security risk, or a terrorist to be prosecuted, it becomes “malleable,” said Bryce Neary, former executive editor of the Seattle Journal of Technology, Environmental & Innovation Law. The US-based lawyer studied the use of drone and surveillance technology in Hong Kong, China, and the US.

If a government “make[s] a legal argument to do so, then the technology is in place and can be utilised regardless, and as needed essentially, when the government wants to change those terms for their use,” Neary told HKFP on the phone.

Moreover, there are potential privacy issues.

To people on the ground, police drones flying between 60 and 90 metres above ground will be barely noticeable to the naked eye, Yeung said, and their buzzing noise is unlikely to cause a nuisance, given other urban noise. 

But nothing escapes the drones flying above us. Police drones, similar to those used in China, can typically “film everything” with “powerful lenses that can zoom in from a great distance, such as seeing what is inside a vehicle,” he said. 

Police drones are marked with flashing lights and reflective decals for people to identify them, but these won’t be visible at their usual operating altitude, Yeung said. “Maybe you can see a flashing dot at night, but you wouldn’t notice it.” 

When asked about privacy concerns by HKFP, the police force said its drone patrols fly over “carefully” planned routes that cover only public areas and do not involve private spaces such as building interiors.

The drones “avoid unnecessarily flying close to individuals or private premises” – unless the situation warrants an investigation, in which case the drones would descend to lower altitudes to collect evidence, police said in a statement.

Video footage with no evidential value will not be kept for more than 31 days, and those obtained as evidence will be classified as such and handled by the investigating unit, according to the police statement. 

Over the past two years, Hong Kong authorities have been introducing more surveillance technologies without hiccups at the “patriots only” legislature – and without protest.

This is in stark contrast to the time when angry demonstrators tore down experimental “smart” lampposts during the city’s 2019 protests and unrest. Discontent with shrinking political freedoms, protesters suspected that the lampposts would eventually allow authorities to conduct surveillance by adding facial recognition capabilities to their panoramic cameras. 

The government strongly denied such plans at the time, and promised the cameras would be disabled or their resolution reduced to assuage concerns. 

However, in a reversal, law enforcement is now considering adding facial recognition technology to its toolkit. Such systems may be connected to police surveillance cameras as soon as this year, police chief Joe Chow said in February. By 2028, police will install a total of 60,000 cameras across Hong Kong. 

The goal is to have “as many cameras as possible” and replicate what’s in mainland China, where there is camera coverage “every two steps,” he said during a TV interview. 

“Times have changed” compared with when society widely opposed increased surveillance and privacy issues, Chow added.

According to police, drone patrols will be used to combat crimes, identify traffic violations, and monitor traffic flows and crowds.

They can be used to track down suspicious individuals, such as someone who appears evasive when police are nearby, police said at press briefings.

They may also soon be equipped with artificial intelligence, but police have not specified whether the same facial recognition technology used on cameras would be applied to drones. 

Present technology from mainland Chinese drone surveillance vendors can identify people, objects, behaviours, and events, according to their product catalogues. They can count and identify various types of vehicles moving on a road, or people in a crowd. They can detect illegally parked cars, smoke, or objects fallen onto power lines. They can spot when protest banners are unfurled. 

Yeung pointed out drones’ ability to lock on to a target person and track them automatically as they move – a feature commonly used by police in the US. In short, drones film from above, while police operate on the ground. 

During the first phase, which began in May last year, drones were deployed to Heung Yuen Wai, a border area with mainland China, and West Kowloon.

In the second phase of the scheme, launched in January this year, police drone patrols were expanded to remote areas, where foot patrols are less frequent and which are more prone to burglaries, such as outlying islands like Lamma Island and Cheung Chau, as well as the Peak.

They also covered busy downtown districts like Central and suburban residential areas such as Yuen Long and Tsuen Wan.

The police force purchased around 700 drones for HK$25 million during the past financial year, and will purchase another 56 in 2026-27 for HK$4.8 million, the Security Bureau told the legislature.

Other agencies also deployed drones for various purposes, from detecting sites at risk of landslides to patrolling several tourist hotspots during Golden Week holidays.

Last year, investigators from the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department apprehended individuals who illegally slaughtered a goat in a rural area, with the help of drones.

Several residents on Lamma Island said they were not aware of police drone patrols, despite prominent banners announcing their presence near the Yung Shue Wan ferry pier and in villages. They said they welcomed the idea that these patrols could prevent bike theft or burglaries, and expressed no worry about privacy issues. 

The island’s resident, who asked to be identified only as Mark, said he believes ultimately it is the presence of police officers that will make a difference in deterring crime, something that drones above his head cannot replace. “What you need is your bobby to be walking and to be visible,” he said. 

Neary believes a chilling effect is the intended purpose of police drones, more than the number or severity of crimes they manage to actually solve.

“Regardless if it’s actually effective in terms of what it’s doing, the fear of the fact that you’re being monitored at all times for any of these petty crimes in public or in private, I think, is going to be a big deterrent for you to do so,” he said. “And maybe that’s the point in the first place, right?” 

Hong Kong’s transport chief has said that late-night aircraft noise over Tung Chung is within acceptable limits in terms of risks to residents’ health.

Lawmaker Chan Hok-fung relayed concerns from residents during a legislative Q&A on Wednesday. He said that the issue “has been aggravated significantly,” since the operating hours of the South Runway were extended to 2am in August last year.

His requests for the utilisation rate of the runway during midnight and 2am were not met by Secretary for Transport and Logistics Mable Chan. However, the minister said that the Airport Authority had conducted health impact assessments with regard to noise.

“The assessment indicates that both short-term and long-term potential health risks resulting from the operation of the 3RS [Three Runway System] are within acceptable levels,” she said.

The Aviation Environmental Federation, a UK-based non-profit, says high levels of aviation noise can lead to chronic sleep disturbance and long-term annoyance.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that the annual average outdoor noise level for aircraft, across 24 hours, remains below 45 decibels. The WHO uses a Day-Evening-Night level metric, taking account of quiet and loud moments throughout a year, whilst penalising night-time noise before averaging them out to a single figure.

In environmental impact assessments, Hong Kong uses the Noise Exposure Forecast (NEF) 25 contour, under which the day-night average sound level of aircraft should be kept at around 55 to 60 decibels.

Hong Kong’s Civil Aviation Department monitors aircraft noise by tracking the peak instantaneous noise level of individual flights passing overhead, rather than a continuous annual average. It then publishes the percentage of total flights which hit certain decibel brackets.

In the 12 months leading up to March 31 this year, 91.49 per cent of flights over Tung Chung emitted noise under 65 decibels – the rest exceeded the limit.

Mitigation measures

The transport chief said on Wednesday that a number of aircraft noise mitigation measures had been rolled out and aviation technology was improving to dampen engine sound.

“Relevant measures include control at source by prohibiting/restricting aircraft with higher noise levels from operating in Hong Kong, and reducing the number of flights overflying densely populated areas at night when weather and safety conditions permit, such as arranging arrival aircraft to land from the southwest over the water, thereby mitigating the noise impact on residents living in the vicinity of the airport,” she said.

“While consolidating and enhancing Hong Kong’s position as an international aviation hub, the Government will continue to balance community well-being and environmental benefits, proactively promoting the synergistic development of the aviation industry and the environment to achieve high-quality and sustainable growth,” she added.

Hongkongers may complain about aircraft noise by contacting the Civil Aviation Department hotline on 2769 6969 or emailing aircraftnoise@cad.gov.hk.