Should NFZ's be as restrictive as they are?

[reckless]

If I am in a no-fly zone having a picnic with friends in a park, in my opinion I should be able to use my quad for a few aerial pics and selfies.
Surely a better restriction might be an altitude ceiling of no more than 10 or 20 metres which won't interfere with aircraft or aerial TV crews filming the big game from above and I can still get my aerial selfie.
Unfortunately NFZ means just that - NO FLY!
I know I can tape some tin foil over the GPS and switch off locations to get around the restriction and simply fly in ATTI mode if the selfie was really important.
I just can't understand the whole NO FLY routine when 10 to 20 metre altitude ceiling would be a better solution for all.

Perhaps they could call it an "Altitude Containment Area - ACA" instead of an "NFZ".
I'm not talking about closeups of 747's, but rather low altitude selfies and points of interest.
What do other members feel about the blanket NO FLY rules pertaining to NFZ's?

How much do NFZ's obstruct your potential to fly?

Are NFZ's fair and is that the best option for the balance between safety and freedom to fly?

 

[Logger]

If they did something like this it might need to be restricted to VFS vertical range only. For example only when acoustic sensors are in use and below 15m sensed height above terrain or some such. Otherwise you could easily thwart a baro height limit by flying laterally off the side of a hill or tall building.

Or if it was purely baro limited they would have to impose a tight lateral limit to prevent people doing this.

 

[jkaiser]

NFZ rules are designed for the lowest common denominator. Most of us will have the cow sense to evaluate the situation even in a non-NFZ before taking off. The minority will try to fly from anywhere w/o regard to anything. I live and work along the northern coast of Singapore, and basically it's just one big NFZ. Sometimes I just want to fly a bit at the field near my house to practise skills (~5-10m altitude), but I can't take off.

 

[HFMan]

So you can't fly in the blue hatched areas in Singapore?

 

[reckless]

NFZ rules are designed for the lowest common denominator. Most of us will have the cow sense to evaluate the situation even in a non-NFZ before taking off. The minority will try to fly from anywhere w/o regard to anything. I live and work along the northern coast of Singapore, and basically it's just one big NFZ. Sometimes I just want to fly a bit at the field near my house to practise skills (~5-10m altitude), but I can't take off.

What harm would there be to be able to get up to 20 meters, the height of a large tree?
I don't get it why you can't just fly at a lower altitude.
I believe the number of NFZ's will increase as more NFZ's are added for whatever lame reason, the birds are nesting, the baby will wake up, the cows won't give milk etc....

 

[jkaiser]

So you can't fly in the blue hatched areas in Singapore?

Yup i stay near the top of the 2nd circle from right, and work at the 4th circle... 2nd circle is a F15 air force base, 4th is an Apache base

 

[jkaiser]

What harm would there be to be able to get up to 20 meters, the height of a large tree?
I don't get it why you can't just fly at a lower altitude.
I believe the number of NFZ's will increase as more NFZ's are added for whatever lame reason, the birds are nesting, the baby will wake up, the cows won't give milk etc....

Yup I agree with you. Sucks, but NFZs pop up due to overzealous flyers who don't fly safely and overzealous authorities who rather enforce than educate.

 

[Cerberus]

Yup I agree with you. Sucks, but NFZs pop up due to overzealous flyers who don't fly safely and overzealous authorities who rather enforce than educate.

I think no matter how good the education, there will always be the time where even a normally obedient flyer will want to capture that one special moment and figured that this one time of ignoring the rules won't harm anyone...

we are all human after all...

 

[Kilrah]

What harm would there be to be able to get up to 20 meters, the height of a large tree?
I don't get it why you can't just fly at a lower altitude.

Nothing if everything goes well, but as you can read in posts on here it isn't always the case, and events like compass calibration issues, bad GPS reception, erroneous obstacle avoidance operation or other faults can cause the aircraft to "fly away" or drift uncontrollably. They don't want to risk that in a place where you're not even supposed to be flying.
For example there are situations and combinations of settings where the aircraft will just climb up to 500m without you being able to do anything about it, or only with very good knowledge of the system that not everybody will have.

 

[reckless]

I think no matter how good the education, there will always be the time where even a normally obedient flyer will want to capture that one special moment and figured that this one time of ignoring the rules won't harm anyone...

we are all human after all...

We wouldn't have to "ignore" the rules to get a desirable shot from 20 metres high if there was a simple "Altitude Containment Area - ACA" instead of an "NFZ".
Trouble is NFZ's will start to grow as media throw their own overly sensationalized horror stories into the mix.

If you scare the cows they wont give milk so NFZ right across all the dairy areas.
Think of the children - NFZ 5k's around every school.
Terrorism - Can't have drones near telecommunications exchanges or towers - 5k NFZ around every tower.
Cute cuddly forest creatures can't be disturbed, NFZ around all forests.
NFZ's around stadiums.
NFZ's here, there and everywhere for whatever reason someone can think of and petition governments and DJI for their own NFZ.

Where will it end?
I'm not so much against NFZ's but there should be a better way of dealing with this stuff and as a collective we should take a stand against the overthrow of our hobby by over enthusiastic media and law makers and demand "Altitude Containment Areas - ACA" instead of an "NFZ's".
Or can anybody think of something better????

 

[reckless]

Nothing if everything goes well, but as you can read in posts on here it isn't always the case, and events like compass calibration issues, bad GPS reception, erroneous obstacle avoidance operation or other faults can cause the aircraft to "fly away" or drift uncontrollably. They don't want to risk that in a place where you're not even supposed to be flying.
For example there are situations and combinations of settings where the aircraft will just climb up to 500m without you being able to do anything about it, or only with very good knowledge of the system that not everybody will have.

Excellent point, but DJI quads don't drift uncontrollably do they?

NFZ - Score = 1

 

[Kilrah]

It happens, like with any other.

 

[Michael Ainsworth]

reckless has a good point though.
My sons house is 4ks from an airstrip, all small planes and those powered hang gliders.
His house is by a lake in a large clearing surrounded by 100 foot plus trees. He was wanting me to take some shots of the house and views.
Tower control refused permission even though I wasn't going above the tree line.
Sometimes these strict NFZ are not flexible enough.

 

[cyrocasabona]

I do not understand so much care to restrict you near the restricted areas, (airports), because here in my city there is only one restriction referring to the airport, but there are many helipads that are not mentioned.