Drone pilot to plead guilty in collision that grounded aircraft fighting Palisades fire

[Chip]

This is a partial transcript of a statement Peter Akemann delivered to his church congregation which he asked the court to consider as part of sentencing. He also submitted a separate letter of apology to the court.

 

[GadgetGuy]

The guy is also an extremely wealthy multi-millionaire, not just your average Joe.
$65,000 to him is Chump Change.
Here is the company he cofounded and sold:

Treyarch - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Think "Call of Duty"

 

[johndrone33]

Details here:

Drone Pilot Pleads Guilty to Crashing into Super Scooper.

Jan 31, 2025

Drone Pilot Pleads Guilty to Crashing into Super Scooper

• The Droning Company
• Replies: 20
• Forum: General Discussions

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Since they found the drone, why was it so hard to just get the email assosiated with the remote id?
Seams to be a dji mini and you have to have an acount to fly it.

 

[mavic3usa]

Since they found the drone, why was it so hard to just get the email assosiated with the remote id?
Seams to be a dji mini and you have to have an acount to fly it.

I wouldn't say it is hard but an email addy can belong to anyone. What if johndrone33 @gmail.com was found in that drone? A DJI drone just needs "a" valid account to fly, not "your" account; any account will do. Besides, in the US, the Mini drone probably is not registered and probably doesn't not transmit RID. Without the remote controller, I'm not really sure how quickly the authorities can retrieve those things.

 

[High_Order1]

I'm split on this.
Yes, he needs to be punished.

I wonder, like some of the other incidents, was he in the airspace where other drones were working, or was he in the layer for manned aircraft?

They knew he was well-to-do when they formulated his punishment. That fine would ruin me; I'd never recover. Is this going to set a precedent for punishing drone incidents? Especially as states further encroach into the drone regulation business.