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Another irresponsible drone operator flying illegally over a fire!

PC1134

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No Cookies | The Mercury

I live in Hobart, Tasmania (Australia) and was horrified to hear of the irresponsible, illegal and highly dangerous activity of the Gatwick Drone flyer, endangering lives and creating untold misery for thousands of flyers. But also the negative impacts this will have on the drone flying community who, mostly, abide by the laws and fly responsibly.

Yet, as you can read in the attached news bulletin, again, we have the same inconceivably stupid actions of some totally idiot, endangering fire-bombing helicopters trying to douse a major fire on Bruny Island, south of Hobart. The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) rules are explicit; you don't fly over or near Emergency Service operations, as well as if you are in the vicinity of a Helicopter Landing pad and see an aircraft, you are to immediately land your drone. In other words, the safety of lives and property come before your attempts to film and or disrupt emergency service operations. At this stage, I don't believe they have caught the offender. But, once again, responsible drone operators will be the ones who will suffer by authorities bringing in tighter and more restrictive laws that will reduce opportunities to fly your drone for fun! Not happy!!!
 
No Cookies | The Mercury

I live in Hobart, Tasmania (Australia) and was horrified to hear of the irresponsible, illegal and highly dangerous activity of the Gatwick Drone flyer, endangering lives and creating untold misery for thousands of flyers. But also the negative impacts this will have on the drone flying community who, mostly, abide by the laws and fly responsibly.

Yet, as you can read in the attached news bulletin, again, we have the same inconceivably stupid actions of some totally idiot, endangering fire-bombing helicopters trying to douse a major fire on Bruny Island, south of Hobart. The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) rules are explicit; you don't fly over or near Emergency Service operations, as well as if you are in the vicinity of a Helicopter Landing pad and see an aircraft, you are to immediately land your drone. In other words, the safety of lives and property come before your attempts to film and or disrupt emergency service operations. At this stage, I don't believe they have caught the offender. But, once again, responsible drone operators will be the ones who will suffer by authorities bringing in tighter and more restrictive laws that will reduce opportunities to fly your drone for fun! Not happy!!!
Gatwick drone flyer does not now seem to exist. The truth will come out in the near future.Perhaps control tower was hacked would they publicize that to the public ?
 
Gatwick drone flyer does not now seem to exist. The truth will come out in the near future.Perhaps control tower was hacked would they publicize that to the public ?
Hacking the tower will make people see things that aren't there?
 
If that's the purpose of the malicious people, possibly...

For example DJI's aeroscope system that's supposed to increase safety by detecting DJI drones and that they sell to airports and governments is anything but secure, and it's easy for someone to fake signals that will make it report a drone (or many) that doesn't actually exist.

Could have been an intentional demonstration that half-assed implementations aren't of any use...
 
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I think we all follow the headlines when it comes to "supposed" drone incidents all over the globe. We've heard it once,we've heard it a thousand time... No flying UNLESS in authorized areas!!!.... Yada Yada Yaadda!
 
Perhaps control tower was hacked would they publicize that to the public ?
Conspiracy theories are fun, but if you wanted to disrupt things it would be a lot easier to just buy a cheap drone and fly it over the airport than try to hack a secure air traffic control system.
 
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At Gatwick there was TV footage of the drone, as well as thousands of pissed off passengers to testify the incident was real. At Hobart, the drone incident was real, too. No conspiracy theories, just inconsiderate drone operators, flying in forbidden circumstances. Another example was someone in Hobart telling me how they flew their drone up 5 kilometres vertically! Why, why, why? As the body of evidence gathers that drones are dangerous weapons, the net of regulations will become increasingly tighter until one day we will all be banned from flying. This is the net result of these irresponsible fools, while the vast majority of us are flying legally, responsibly and enjoying our hobby in safety and consideration of others.
 
Another example was someone in Hobart telling me how they flew their drone up 5 kilometres vertically! Why, why, why?
How, how, how?
You should have asked him for more details of how he achieved that.
A stock DJI drone isn't going to do that and if he hacked it, he wouldn't have got the drone back intact.
Just to get up to that height and back would take 45 minutes.
And if he somehow managed to get that high, it's almost certain that winds at that level would have taken the drone in the direction of New Zealand.
 
At Gatwick there was TV footage of the drone, as well as thousands of pissed off passengers to testify the incident was real. At Hobart, the drone incident was real, too. No conspiracy theories, just inconsiderate drone operators, flying in forbidden circumstances. Another example was someone in Hobart telling me how they flew their drone up 5 kilometres vertically! Why, why, why? As the body of evidence gathers that drones are dangerous weapons, the net of regulations will become increasingly tighter until one day we will all be banned from flying. This is the net result of these irresponsible fools, while the vast majority of us are flying legally, responsibly and enjoying our hobby in safety and consideration of others.
Really you know for fact this is real? prove it show us the pictures, Im sure all those people in the terminal ran outside and saw drones over the air field. Come on dude nothing has been proven yet
 
So what hit pentagon on 9/11??
Definitely it wasn't airliner
 
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And even if your conspiracy theories were correct, the reality is, whether fact or fiction, there is a real perception in the mind of the public that drones are intrusive, unsafe and potentially deadly. Therefore their use must be restricted at the very least, or banned altogether. We've seen this same debate raging with seemingly benign AirBnBs in Australia and no doubt worldwide where the do-gooders have been accusing the short term holiday rentals market of causing significant reductions in the availability of rental properties for those people who need to rent. To counter this authorities are actively working out ways to make things much tougher for those with AirBnBs. I see the drone issue going the same way. Every time there is a negative news story, it drives another nail in the coffin of Draconian regulations of our hobby.
 
And even if your conspiracy theories were correct, the reality is, whether fact or fiction, there is a real perception in the mind of the public that drones are intrusive, unsafe and potentially deadly. Therefore their use must be restricted at the very least, or banned altogether. We've seen this same debate raging with seemingly benign AirBnBs in Australia and no doubt worldwide where the do-gooders have been accusing the short term holiday rentals market of causing significant reductions in the availability of rental properties for those people who need to rent. To counter this authorities are actively working out ways to make things much tougher for those with AirBnBs. I see the drone issue going the same way. Every time there is a negative news story, it drives another nail in the coffin of Draconian regulations of our hobby.
There is certainy a minority of people in the comments section of newspapers calling for banni g all UAVs casterating any one with a drlne because they must be a pervert etc.
 
And even if your conspiracy theories were correct, the reality is, whether fact or fiction, there is a real perception in the mind of the public that drones are intrusive, unsafe and potentially deadly. Therefore their use must be restricted at the very least, or banned altogether. We've seen this same debate raging with seemingly benign AirBnBs in Australia and no doubt worldwide where the do-gooders have been accusing the short term holiday rentals market of causing significant reductions in the availability of rental properties for those people who need to rent. To counter this authorities are actively working out ways to make things much tougher for those with AirBnBs. I see the drone issue going the same way. Every time there is a negative news story, it drives another nail in the coffin of Draconian regulations of our hobby.
More regulations, will result to more violations.

If regulations didn't exist, "irresponsible" wouldn't exist, too.

It's already illegal to fly over airfields for example. What "more regulations" are you waiting about it?
NO FLY, means complete ban. Already. Nothing stricter can be done.
We cannot fly over an airfield. Period.

If someone bans drones from forests, because someone flew illegally over an airport, HE is the idiot and should be banned from his public position.
 
Drone pilots will NEVER fear the law until EXTREME Punishment is handed out after 100% proof of an infraction/guilty party
Sorry but as long as we keep playing these hand slapping games...... it will not end.
Attempted murder........not funny
 
Well, as predicted, CASA (Civil Aviation Safety Authority) of Australia who regulates all aircraft operations in this country, in response to this drone operator flying over the fire fighting helicopters and forcing them to abandon their operations, has foreshadowed new requirements they will be enforcing next year where all hobby drone pilots will need to be registered by CASA. At a cost no doubt, and along with this they are introducing new technology that will identify the serial number of your drone if it is detected flying illegally so they can start prosecuting offenders. You watch, Australia will start to make things a lot tougher, all thanks to a few fwits flounting the law and tarnishing the good image of the majority of responsible drone pilots.
 
The airplane engines and landing gear found in the rubble would indicate otherwise, but like I said, conspiracy theories are fun.
The hole in the Pentagon is too small for an airliner to fit thru. Physical Measurements dont lie........
 
Well, as predicted, CASA (Civil Aviation Safety Authority) of Australia who regulates all aircraft operations in this country, in response to this drone operator flying over the fire fighting helicopters and forcing them to abandon their operations, has foreshadowed new requirements they will be enforcing next year where all hobby drone pilots will need to be registered by CASA. At a cost no doubt, and along with this they are introducing new technology that will identify the serial number of your drone if it is detected flying illegally so they can start prosecuting offenders. You watch, Australia will start to make things a lot tougher, all thanks to a few fwits flounting the law and tarnishing the good image of the majority of responsible drone pilots.

Really, no one should be surprised by this - it was always going to happen. The Fire Fighting Helicopter incident was not the only one to occur in recent times - there have been others. If the proposed new regulatory measures are restricted to mandatory registration and the introduction of Drone Detection technology then I say that's a win-win.

Indeed, no one should be surprised if/when CASA hands down even more punitive measures due to, as mentioned above, "a few f-wits flouting the law and tarnishing the good image of the majority of responsible drone pilots". Is there a viable way to reign in the "idiot" minority? Is it about education? Is it about setting the example by severely punishing wrongdoers?

Just yesterday I was at one of Brisbane's 10 designated Drone parks (places where the non-drone flying public is encouraged to avoid when drones are operating in the area) practicing flying my drone with a few different settings. There was a guy there with his partner and kid flying a Phantom everywhere but within the boundaries of the designated (and clearly signed) area.

I politely mentioned to him that it might not be a good optics for people to see what he was doing given that he was standing less than 5 metres away from the Drone Park sign. The guy totally ignored me but his wife said, "Oh that's OK - we won't be here for much longer". I replied, "Just wanted to mention it" and walked away.

Folks, until such time as this "it's all about me" attitude is eradicated the recreational drone flying community will continue to be viewed as a bunch of cowboys who should be totally banned. Even if only say 10% of the public become drone haters, they will be the ones who shout their opinions from the rooftops. It's how it always happens - the squeaky wheel gets the oil.
 
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