Info Request: air harbor air space rules

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Hi all, I wonder if you could fill me in or point me to an app/resource to help me discover.

Short story: was flying near an air harbor (see map below), but I wasn't over the lake / flight lanes (which are in the middle of the lake marked by flashing buoys).

Incident I was basically taking pictures of a historic building on shore. It's a big building, so at one point I had backed up to get it all in the shot and was at a low altitude, and unfortunately hit some lines on a sailboat mast. Down went the drone onto the boat deck. The boat slips are within the air harbor property (where the planes dock) and it was past office hours, so the front gate was locked. Very frustrating.

Then a plane came in. I thought I could ask the pilot to let me retrieve the M2P from where it fell on the boat and he said "NO!", got very angry and starting saying angry things like "why is your plane more important than mine", yada. He's pissed, I get that.

"Come back in the morning after I talk to my partner."

But he said I was supposed to ask permission to fly there. Without it, I shouldn't be within 5 miles of the air harbor. That's what I'm here to ask: is he correct? I did not consult a app like Airmap or Kittyhawk (though I have them), but relied on DJI Go to tell me if there were no fly zones (there weren't). But I thought the 5 mile rule was for land airports.

I don't really want to get into it with him. I was very apologetic (it didn't matter) and I will be again in the morning, but I want to know where I stand in case it gets sticky.

Here's his business on the map and you can zoom out to see the lake he operates on (I was talking shots of the building called Lake Union Steam Plant, which as you can see, is not near the flight lanes):

Seattle Seaplanes · 1325 Fairview Ave E, Seattle, WA 98102

★★★★★ · Seaplane base

www.google.com

Thanks for any tips / advice,
Chris

Edit: yes, I was stupid.

 

[Duckhunter50]

I'm sorry to hear you lost your done.

Checking the airspace in that area it looks like a caution area but not any controlled airspace as far as i can tell. I probably would have flown there.

 

[maintenanceguy]

I understand his being upset. You flew in an area that you knew would likely have other air traffic and you crashed there. See it from his point of view. In his mind, if he lets you retrieve your drone, your next flight might cause more damage than just hitting the rigging of a sailboat.

You don't have the moral high ground. When you asked why his plane was more important than yours, he was thinking "because I don't crash mine into other people's stuff"

 

[sar104]

Hi all, I wonder if you could fill me in or point me to an app/resource to help me discover.

Short story: was flying near an air harbor (see map below), but I wasn't over the lake / flight lanes (which are in the middle of the lake marked by flashing buoys).

Incident I was basically taking pictures of a historic building on shore. It's a big building, so at one point I had backed up to get it all in the shot and was at a low altitude, and unfortunately hit some lines on a sailboat mast. Down went the drone onto the boat deck. The boat slips are within the air harbor property (where the planes dock) and it was past office hours, so the front gate was locked. Very frustrating.

Then a plane came in. I thought I could ask the pilot to let me retrieve the M2P from where it fell on the boat and he said "NO!", got very angry and starting saying angry things like "why is your plane more important than mine", yada. He's pissed, I get that.

"Come back in the morning after I talk to my partner."

But he said I was supposed to ask permission to fly there. Without it, I shouldn't be within 5 miles of the air harbor. That's what I'm here to ask: is he correct? I did not consult a app like Airmap or Kittyhawk (though I have them), but relied on DJI Go to tell me if there were no fly zones (there weren't). But I thought the 5 mile rule was for land airports.

I don't really want to get into it with him. I was very apologetic (it didn't matter) and I will be again in the morning, but I want to know where I stand in case it gets sticky.

Here's his business on the map and you can zoom out to see the lake he operates on (I was talking shots of the building called Lake Union Steam Plant, which as you can see, is not near the flight lanes):

Seattle Seaplanes · 1325 Fairview Ave E, Seattle, WA 98102

★★★★★ · Seaplane base

www.google.com

Thanks for any tips / advice,
Chris

Edit: yes, I was stupid.

It's Class G airspace underneath 1800 ft Seattle Class B, and the 5-mile rule went away when the 336 was repealed in 2018, i.e. you are no longer required to inform airports before flying. The business owner doesn't own the airspace and the flight was legal in terms of location provided that there are no local ordinances prohibiting takeoff/landing in that part of the city - no permission needed.

 

[BigAl07]

^^^ What he said...

But that doesn't mean all is well. Your UAS ended up on "private property" which is something well outside of FAA/Air Regulations. Hopefully today will go better but if they want to quote regulations they need to be CURRENT with them just like the PILOT is with his regulations.

5 Miles was out the window a good while back but we still have MANY (I mean a LOT) UAS operators who are also quoting that old rule. It's just "easy to remember and regurgitate" rather than actually quoting the airspace regulations LOL.

 

[sar104]

^^^ What he said...

But that doesn't mean all is well. Your UAS ended up on "private property" which is something well outside of FAA/Air Regulations. Hopefully today will go better but if they want to quote regulations they need to be CURRENT with them just like the PILOT is with his regulations.

5 Miles was out the window a good while back but we still have MANY (I mean a LOT) UAS operators who are also quoting that old rule. It's just "easy to remember and regurgitate" rather than actually quoting the airspace regulations LOL.

Completely correct. The proprietor or boat owner could sue for damages, or report the incident to LE or the FAA. What they can't do is keep the aircraft.

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Completely correct. The proprietor or boat owner could sue for damages, or report the incident to LE or the FAA. What they can't do is keep the aircraft.

It could be worse. When I was there this morning, Mr. Young "very angry" Pilot from last night was there and still very angry. I asked if he had found the aircraft and he said "No, but if I had, I would have nailed it to the wall in the office".

They wouldn't let me near the boats, which are leased by a dry dock company down the road. I went down to their office and a gentlemen was helpful enough to walk down there and help me peer onto the boats, but we couldn't see it. I know it was there on one of them because I could see the after-crash video feed -- it was not under water.

So now I'm getting the logs to post here in hopes that a more exact coordinate can be retrieved from them. I'll post when I have them.

Chris

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Here's the LOG in Flightviewer. Let me know if you want to see the txt file attached.

I downloaded the KMZ and looked at it in Google Earth Pro. It looks to me like it hit the top of the mast of the last boat next to the office building, then went down on the deck of that boat. Is that what we all see? I want to be sure before I go down and bother that guy again. And he may need permissions to get onto any of these boats

DJI Flight Log Viewer | Phantom Help

Upload and view flight logs from your DJI drones

www.phantomhelp.com

Thanks for any tips and/or advice,
Chris

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Here is the .TXT file and the KMZ (in a ZIP file) attached, for ease and comfort:

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Epilogue: the aircraft was exactly where the map indicated. That boat hasn't moved in decades, my source told me, but the tarps have been added (since the satellite image), which is why the AC wasn't seen on first pass. It had actually gone down the hole that the main mast was poking though and was laying under the tarp.

Soon comes the damage assessment, with at least one landing peg broken. The gimbal looks attached as normal, but I haven't powered it up yet.

Chris

 

[Duckhunter50]

I'm so glad to hear that you were able to get your drone back. I hope the damage is very minor. I think sometimes people want to make accidents like this a bigger deal than they really are. I suspect that there was little if any damage to the boat and most was sustained by your drone. Too often we tend towards hyperbole rather than the pragmatic.