Drone hampers aircraft fighting forest fire. This is why they make laws!

[Duroncrash]

It only take a few to ruin it for everyone

Drone operators blast 'irresponsible and selfish' flight that grounded firefighters
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/drone-operators-blast-irresponsible-and-selfish-flight-that-grounded-firefighters-1.3193540

 

[Julez]

Very simple solution to this- make the consumer show an AMA card before they can purchase an rc aircraft, and have AMA put in place an altitude restriction for flying areas that aren't just within 5 miles of an airport.

If the FAA were to be really smart about this, they would work with the FCC and major rc companies to make it so that rc aircraft receivers have a built in transmitter that broadcasts the RFID of that receiver when in use. The RFID tag on the receiver could be traced back to who bought the item (What AMA membership card was shown when purchasing) and the pilot responsible could be taken into custody.

Let's go through a scenario:

Bob wants to fly quadcopters. He purchases AMA membership without reading any of the rules or regulations. He goes into his LHS and buys a DJI Phantom, and shows his AMA card on checkout. The LHS links his AMA number to the RFID of the Phantom that Bob purchased.

Bob then drove out to an airport to get some sweet shots of planes landing and taking off. He almost hits a plane that is landing and brings the phantom in, driving away quickly and hoping that nobody saw him. However, the commercial jet that he almost hit picked up the RFID tag of his Phantom, and the FAA was able to trace the RFID to his AMA membership and subsequently arrested Bob. Ta- Da!

Going further with this, the FCC could mandate that any rc aircraft receivers must broadcast their RFID tag in order to be FCC certified. This way, even if the pilot is not an AMA member, any incident involving the RFID tag of their aircraft can be traced back to them- if the RFID tag isn't linked to the AMA account, then it's linked to their credit card account or something else that is hard- wired to them. I think you get the general idea.

It might seem totalitarian- but it doesn't hurt any of us who are flying the way we're supposed to be flying.

 

[mjcp]

Great... 'till some £$%^ puts a gun on their DJi and refuses to show an AMA card due to the 2nd... (though I'd say technically not being borne while in flight /troll_off)

mjcp

 

[bhursey]

FYI AMA is 3 miles not 5

https://www.modelaircraft.org/files/105.pdf

 

[JohnC]

This is a stupid rhetorical question: "Why can't people be responsible?"

I don't belong to the AMA, and I don't want to 'have to' belong just to fly RC aircraft. I'm responsible, and the odds are very low that I'd endanger someone else.

But accidents do happen, and if I 'lose' my RC aircraft, and it falls on a roadway or freeway and someone is startled by it and a crash occurs . . .

I accept a driver's license, I don't 'accept' car registration, but I comply because I'll get a ticket. I don't like paying car insurance, but I do like having coverage . . .

This thing with 'drones' will work itself out.

 

[Julez]

This is a stupid rhetorical question: "Why can't people be responsible?"

I don't belong to the AMA, and I don't want to 'have to' belong just to fly RC aircraft. I'm responsible, and the odds are very low that I'd endanger someone else.

But accidents do happen, and if I 'lose' my RC aircraft, and it falls on a roadway or freeway and someone is startled by it and a crash occurs . . .

I accept a driver's license, I don't 'accept' car registration, but I comply because I'll get a ticket. I don't like paying car insurance, but I do like having coverage . . .

This thing with 'drones' will work itself out.

Unfortunately at the present it seems like it will 'work itself out' in the form of more regulation.

Simple trusting people to be responsible isn't feasible- we have laws because not everyone can be trusted to make common sense moral and ethical decisions. I'd much rather have regulation that works to cut the problem off at the roots than have regulation that just punishes people who cause the problem. If you yank out a weed and you yank all the roots out with it, it won't grow back. If you chop off the top of the weed because it grew too high, it's going to grow back. The FAA can regulate all it wants, but some people still aren't going to pay any heed.

 

[FlyingMonkey]

I'm not saying it's not actually happening, but you know how the media loves to hype things up.

Before I go any further, I will say I work with wildland fire. I have even worked a wildfire detail (in south Florida, not out west.) where aerial support was involved. Also, I am a "drone" pilot.


I have a few problems with these stories.

First, if there's a thread bad enough to ground the aircraft, why are we not hearing about them searching for the person responsible for grounding the aircraft?

Second, where's the arrests? As I mentioned above, this is something I presume the officials are taking serious, enough that they're grounding suppression teams which puts property and lives at risk. You'd think they'd find someone at least one of the times that this has happened.

Third, where's the video? I don't know about you, but I'm not going to get awesome footage like that, and not post it somewhere. And I'm not buying the excuse that "the pilot got scared, so he didn't post it." The negative press about flying RC around fires has been heavy enough that I doubt anyone is going to do it, that doesn't understand that they're not going to be popular. So, if they took the risk of flying during a fire, then why aren't they capitalizing on that by posting their videos?

 

[razor02097]

Very simple solution to this- make the consumer show an AMA card before they can purchase an rc aircraft, and have AMA put in place an altitude restriction for flying areas that aren't just within 5 miles of an airport.

If the FAA were to be really smart about this, they would work with the FCC and major rc companies to make it so that rc aircraft receivers have a built in transmitter that broadcasts the RFID of that receiver when in use. The RFID tag on the receiver could be traced back to who bought the item (What AMA membership card was shown when purchasing) and the pilot responsible could be taken into custody.

Let's go through a scenario:

Bob wants to fly quadcopters. He purchases AMA membership without reading any of the rules or regulations. He goes into his LHS and buys a DJI Phantom, and shows his AMA card on checkout. The LHS links his AMA number to the RFID of the Phantom that Bob purchased.

Bob then drove out to an airport to get some sweet shots of planes landing and taking off. He almost hits a plane that is landing and brings the phantom in, driving away quickly and hoping that nobody saw him. However, the commercial jet that he almost hit picked up the RFID tag of his Phantom, and the FAA was able to trace the RFID to his AMA membership and subsequently arrested Bob. Ta- Da!

Going further with this, the FCC could mandate that any rc aircraft receivers must broadcast their RFID tag in order to be FCC certified. This way, even if the pilot is not an AMA member, any incident involving the RFID tag of their aircraft can be traced back to them- if the RFID tag isn't linked to the AMA account, then it's linked to their credit card account or something else that is hard- wired to them. I think you get the general idea.

It might seem totalitarian- but it doesn't hurt any of us who are flying the way we're supposed to be flying.

Now lets say Bob bought his quad, flew it for a while and decided it wasn't for him. He sells it to Jim who is the one that flew at the airport. Why should Bob be arrested for something Jim did?

Your plan is flawed in the way it will completely destroy the second hand market. It also mandates people to join a private organization for a recreational activity. That is what is known as a monopoly. That would be like mandating people join the NRA in order to own a gun. Or the NHRA if they want to drag race. There is no such mandate.

This is a stupid rhetorical question: "Why can't people be responsible?"

I don't belong to the AMA, and I don't want to 'have to' belong just to fly RC aircraft. I'm responsible, and the odds are very low that I'd endanger someone else.

But accidents do happen, and if I 'lose' my RC aircraft, and it falls on a roadway or freeway and someone is startled by it and a crash occurs . . .

I accept a driver's license, I don't 'accept' car registration, but I comply because I'll get a ticket. I don't like paying car insurance, but I do like having coverage . . .

This thing with 'drones' will work itself out.

Car registration is only required for vehicles driven on public roads and is supposed to pay for maintaining the roads. The license is to make sure you are competent driving around other people but to my knowledge you don't need a drivers license to buy or own a car or drive it on private property.


Before anyone brings it up... you don't need a license or permit to buy a gun either. There are still states that allow people to open carry a firearm with no license or permit. Most states do offer a concealed carry permit that will allow an individual to carry concealed.

 

[Julez]

Now lets say Bob bought his quad, flew it for a while and decided it wasn't for him. He sells it to Jim who is the one that flew at the airport. Why should Bob be arrested for something Jim did?

Your plan is flawed in the way it will completely destroy the second hand market. It also mandates people to join a private organization for a recreational activity. That is what is known as a monopoly. That would be like mandating people join the NRA in order to own a gun. Or the NHRA if they want to drag race. There is no such mandate.

I'd much rather join the AMA then have to take an FAA certified course just to fly rc models. Thank you for pointing out the flaws with second hand markets- honestly that's something that completely flew over my head.

What changes do you think could be made to solve the issue?

 

[razor02097]

I'd much rather join the AMA then have to take an FAA certified course just to fly rc models. Thank you for pointing out the flaws with second hand markets- honestly that's something that completely flew over my head.

What changes do you think could be made to solve the issue?

Honestly the laws already exist...in a sense. California law Penal Code 409.5 allows officers to restrict access to what would be considered a "menace" to the public... disasters, terrorism, and fire would be an example.

http://codes.lp.findlaw.com/cacode/PEN/3/1/11/s409.5

I know technically a UAV isn't a person. But the law is pretty much to the point and if they want to revise that code to include civilian UAV that would make it pretty darn easy for them.

For the airports I think the height ceiling restriction within a certain distance is reasonable. However the law should be reasonable too... Lets face it... a jetliner isn't supposed to fly at 400 feet 5 miles out of an airport. That would be pretty dangerous.

 

[Corbarrad]

I'd much rather join the AMA then have to take an FAA certified course just to fly rc models. Thank you for pointing out the flaws with second hand markets- honestly that's something that completely flew over my head.

What changes do you think could be made to solve the issue?

I'm not sure how to solve the issue, either, but I feel there is no "simple solution" and what you're proposing will end up being a major hassle for anyone trying to follow the rules. Others will be punished even though they are flying safe because they're not obeying the letter of the law. And then there will be those that throw both rules and common sense out of the window to do anything they like because "the rules are stupid, man" and most of them will get away with it.

The person in your scenario will most likely end up not buying that quad, because if he hasn't checked out the rules he won't know about mandatory AMA insurance. so he'll enter the store, get turned away because he doesn't have an AMA card with him and most likely never return once he figures out that costs money, too.
Yes, he was ready to drop a thousand bucks on a quad, but the prospect of registering and paying an annual $60 more will make him change his mind. I've seen it happen for as little as $5 to register at a karting place.

You can't make AMA membership mandatory, because the AMA is not a body of government but basically nothing but another insurance company. Imagine trying to make an insurance at say, All-State mandatory for every porsche owner out there.. I'm guessing the other insurance companies would have to say something about it. So all the other insurance companies should get a shot, too, right? figuring out which insurance is valid will be a lot of fun for the guy behind the counter and a a cost factor for the store they work at so many stores will stop selling drones altogether.

This doesn't even take technical concerns or that you can just go out and scratch build a quad into account.

All in all this seems like the kind of stuff the entertainment industry has been trying to do for years. It's been nothing but trouble for legitimate users and I'd be willing to bet real money that it hasn't stopped a single pirated copy of "Scary Movie 22 - The Rehash" being made.

All we, as a community can do is try and make things as safe as possible, teaching others how to be safe while having fun. Of course this battle has likely been lost since before 9500BC when it first became possible to go "hold my beer and watch this!"

Yes, that's when beer was invented, not stupidity...

 

[bhursey]

I'm not sure how to solve the issue, either, but I feel there is no "simple solution" and what you're proposing will end up being a major hassle for anyone trying to follow the rules. Others will be punished even though they are flying safe because they're not obeying the letter of the law. And then there will be those that throw both rules and common sense out of the window to do anything they like because "the rules are stupid, man" and most of them will get away with it.

The person in your scenario will most likely end up not buying that quad, because if he hasn't checked out the rules he won't know about mandatory AMA insurance. so he'll enter the store, get turned away because he doesn't have an AMA card with him and most likely never return once he figures out that costs money, too.
Yes, he was ready to drop a thousand bucks on a quad, but the prospect of registering and paying an annual $60 more will make him change his mind. I've seen it happen for as little as $5 to register at a karting place.

You can't make AMA membership mandatory, because the AMA is not a body of government but basically nothing but another insurance company. Imagine trying to make an insurance at say, All-State mandatory for every porsche owner out there.. I'm guessing the other insurance companies would have to say something about it. So all the other insurance companies should get a shot, too, right? figuring out which insurance is valid will be a lot of fun for the guy behind the counter and a a cost factor for the store they work at so many stores will stop selling drones altogether.

This doesn't even take technical concerns or that you can just go out and scratch build a quad into account.

All in all this seems like the kind of stuff the entertainment industry has been trying to do for years. It's been nothing but trouble for legitimate users and I'd be willing to bet real money that it hasn't stopped a single pirated copy of "Scary Movie 22 - The Rehash" being made.

All we, as a community can do is try and make things as safe as possible, teaching others how to be safe while having fun. Of course this battle has likely been lost since before 9500BC when it first became possible to go "hold my beer and watch this!"

Yes, that's when beer was invented, not stupidity...

Thats a good point I was thinking of the AMA thing.. However it is a private organization.. When I worked at a hobby shop in the 90s. We would basically very highly suggest joining the local club and getting a trainer. This meant joining AMA and learning the rules. Now days there is not as big of an investment, and the aircraft are easier to fly so that is not as much of a push. Also the large % of sales is online. In the 90s it was all local with a tiny bit of mail order from tower hobbies catalog. So most of the time we were able to discus safety and our recommendations how to successfully succeed in the hobby safely..
The hobby shop went out of business in 2004 because of the increased competition of online sales. Seemed when the hobby was not as large and harder to do safety issues were not as big of a problem. What would you say is more of a threat quadcopter, or fixed wing fpv?

 

[ZoomNBoom]

What changes do you think could be made to solve the issue?

Its a good question that so far, no one has found a really good answer to.
Basically you can only do two things: somehow make it impossible to happen or make sure that if it happens, the person in question can be held accountable and thus ensure few if any people will be stupid enough to try it.

About the first approach; geofencing already works on many drones, preventing them from flying too close to airfields and the like, its just that in this case, the fence would have to be 'dynamic'. The UAV would therefore need to be connected to the internet somehow, probably not practical; or pick up a local signal from police/fire fighters that tells the drone to rth/land and stay on the ground for x time or avoid a certain area for a given period of time. Sooner or later something like that will be implemented in our drones, perhaps even mandated. And it will cause problems and abuse, and it wont be watertight (opensource flight controllers will always be able to work around it) but it might go a long way solving the problem for "DJI pilots".

As for being able to identify the pilot; there could be a car like registration. More aptly, an airplane like registration (razor may think you can fly a full scale airplane on your own property without one, but he'd be wrong). Or it could go even further, if our drones obtain flarm/transponder like capabilities that allows ATC and other planes (and drones) to see and ID each craft. To get there, the device would need to be further miniaturized, or we could use a ground based transponder that gets its data via telemetry from the drone. That could all be integrated in the radio. As above, such a solution will cause problems and abuse, privacy concerns, can be worked around by hobbyists who know what they are doing, but to the extend this gets implemented, it would also be immensely useful for safety.

 

[Stradawhovious]

Very simple solution to this- make the consumer show an AMA card before they can purchase an rc aircraft, and have AMA put in place an altitude restriction for flying areas that aren't just within 5 miles of an airport.

The Government can't/won't require the membership of a non-governmental organization. And even if they did, to believe that just because someone is a member of the AMA means that they are ALL going to be responsible and not do stupid things is foolish at best. It would just mean that it would cost an irresponsible person (AND responsible persons) another $30 or so to buy a multirotor.

Case in point... I know plenty of NRA members that I will NEVER go shooting with because they are irresponsible and dangerous. I would rather leave the range with the same number of holes I arrived with.

The sad fact is that regulations and laws do nothing more than provide hurdles and headaches for the responsible and law abiding.


The simple solution is to cure stupid. Stop putting warning labels like "Do Not Drink" on bottles of bleach and "Do not use in bathtub" on hairdryers.

It would be a start.

 

[JohnC]

So this is all starting to make more sense to me. I'm flying my Radian Pro at the Berkeley Marina in the San Francisco Bay Area, and it's a venue where kite flyers, dog walkers, RC plane and drone flyers have to share space.

I'm trying to fly every day (it gets me out of the office) and that now includes weekends, when the use of the space is increased.

I'm standing with a group of drone flyers who have wrapped up their flying and about 50 yards away, someone is flying fpv with googles and putting a small quad through extreme maneuvers. Up, Down, Sideways, Rolls, Loops. Zooming around at high speed.

He's sitting at a picnic table and wearing the googles, so his only awareness is what he's seeing through the googles. It was a strange sight. Like a kid so engrossed with a video game a bomb could go off and he wouldn't know it. With such a limited field of view, and with such violent maneuvers (some close to the ground), how can a pilot avoid colliding with a pedestrian who ventures into the air (ground) space of the flight envelope?

I'm not making any sort of judgement here, I'm just curious. Do such maneuvers help a drone pilot get a wider sense of the air (ground) space they are flying in?

 

[Stradawhovious]

I'm standing with a group of drone flyers who have wrapped up their flying and about 50 yards away, someone is flying fpv with googles and putting a small quad through extreme maneuvers. Up, Down, Sideways, Rolls, Loops. Zooming around at high speed.

I've had enough experience with FPV to know that it is incredibly limiting as far as knowing your surroundings. I rely on a spotter to let me know if I'm in danger of encountering obstacles, and to make sure that I'm not anywhere near another human being (that's not part of my immediate group).

Flying manuvers like that, near a crowd of people, with no line of sight and no spotter.... well, all of those things individually are irresponsible. Add them all together and it's downright dangerous, regardless of the pilot's skill level.

I could never be convinced otherwise.

Like it or not, the FAA is GOING to have their hand in this. As I keep telling my peers that I fly with, it's better to be positive and try and have a hand in molding the regulations before they are authored than it is to dig in your heels, pout and be a victim once they are enforced.

The simple fact is that there will DEFINATELY be a certification process for those people who use UAVs in any way other than recreation, most likely in the form of an exemption or Sport Pilot rating requirement. There is a possibility there will be a certification process for hobbyists as well.

Winter is coming.

You will need a good jacket.

 

[razor02097]

razor may think you can fly a full scale airplane on your own property without one, but he'd be wrong.

When did I say that? Look sorry if I have upset you in some way but you're on the verge of slander now.

 

[JohnC]

Met a couple of videographers last week as they aborted their maiden flight with a Phantom 3 drone.

They are getting into it because they often have to hire a drone pilot on some of their shoots, and . . . why not do it themselves?

They were unable to download an app they needed at the park, so no flight that day.

Saw them again this morning - it was their 3rd or 4th flight. It was interesting to hang out for a while and watch their experience. We chatted a bit about this thread (and the experience I had watching the other FPV pilot).

One comment was that it will be a natural progression for Police and Fire Departments to adopt (and for police to weaponize) drones. I live near a high crime area, and I'd prefer a police drone to a police helicopter doing orbits around the neighborhood. Drones are just not as noisy as a helicopter. When these departments come on line with this technology, you are not going to be hearing about a fire department not deploying because there is a drone in the air.

-------------------------------------------

And YES! when flying FPV with goggles, in a park where there are people and dogs, use a spotter !!!!!!!!

 

[Torf]

This is a stupid rhetorical question: "Why can't people be responsible?"

I accept a driver's license, I don't 'accept' car registration, but I comply because I'll get a ticket. I don't like paying car insurance, but I do like having coverage . . .

This thing with 'drones' will work itself out.

If they invented cars in 2010, they would have never been allowed to be sold, and the CPSC would sue the first manufacturer out of business.

I don't trust ANYTHING to work itself out anymore, especially when it seems like so many hobbyists clamor for more restrictions, expenses, licenses and laws regulating their hobby.

These days, I think more people are working on making it mandatory to set your car on auto-drive then are actually trying to develop a practical flying car.