What about the pilots of the manned aircraft that report drones 1 - 1 1/2 miles away from them? You calling them liars? I'd love to see a drone flier charged with flying beyond VLOS and calling one of those pilots as an expert. Those pilots actually reported the "sightings" to the FAA and they are a matter of record.
Why insinuate that I'm calling someone a liar in a scenario that you bring up after what I posted? I'm just not that good at seeing into the future (as my stock portfolio clearly indicates).
I'm talking about the Mavic Pro seen by me from from the ground. It is not visible to me at about 300 - 400 m against the background sky (white or blue) - and that is with reference to the Home2Drone distance on the display- something known and accurate to a few metres.
(Never mind against grey/brown forest in the Canadian winter. )
Per visual acuity math (which looks at line pairs, not single objects in space) a .335 m object (the MP) should be visible to about 1100 metres for 20/20 vision in optimal contrast conditions. Considering how "thin" the arms of the MP are, it's probably better to estimate the size of the body of the MP alone at its folded size: 200mm. In that case the math works to 687 m. But a MP is not a line pair - so I'm sure the distance that it would be easy to see at is much less than 1100 m and probably less than 500m. My experience bears that out to be sure. I'll be flying over water next week and perhaps have optimal conditions to see how far it is when I lose it (outbound) and acquire it (inbound).
If a pilot is reporting a drone at 1 - 1.5 (2700m+) miles then either the drone was a lot larger than a Mavic Pro or the estimate of distance was exaggerated by the pilot observer. I'll back the 2nd of those: pilots are used to seeing things they know well (other aircraft) and not used to seeing drones. ie: what he (they) saw was much closer.
Also bear in mind that those "matter of record" reports are "records" of what the pilot
reported. They are not records of the actual distance as that would require a measurement system or precise knowledge of the positions of the observer and observed at the time of the observation. The Mk I eyeball, regardless of the pilot's opinion, is just not up to it. Esp. when seeing something he is not accustomed to seeing in the sky.