Line of Sight - Really?

[GadgetGuy]

It might be you have information available to you that others don’t. I can’t see any evidence to suggest identification of pilot location is the principal intent of VLOS requirements. No depth perception, limited FOV, greatly reduced situational awareness and limited opportunity for early identification of a threat as compared to within VLOS operation. Now consider the situation with loss of downlink, even worse the drone diligently following a direct RTH path blindly from a distance perhaps several km distant from the operator. To suggest the VLOS requirement isn’t imposed with the principal intent of safety seems more than a little ridiculous.

How do you explain the military successfully flying their drones in the Middle East from underground bunkers in NV without VLOS? The FAA very clearly stated, when they made hobbyist pilot registration mandatory, that their biggest problem, which it would not solve, was locating the drone pilot. Shortly thereafter, they adopted VLOS as a requirement. Do you really think that was a coincidence, and that it was not intended to also aid in locating the pilot? Far more new pilots are disoriented by flying VLOS because they cannot discern the aircraft orientation, and cannot tell from a distance which direction they are flying. Flying by FPV, when out of the immediate airspace during takeoff and landing, is far easier to grasp and understand. It's like playing a video game. As to your loss of downlink, the only reason you should be losing your downlink is because your LOS is blocked, in which case, if your RTH is set correctly, the downlink is immediately restored by a simple ascension above the blocking obstruction, allowing immediate restoral of FPV. The only time I have ever lost FPV that resulted in RTH flying blind back to the home point, without control being restored earlier, was when flying an Autel EVO! DJI's Occusync 2 is rock solid out to 5 miles with clear LOS. If you are flying without clear LOS, shame on you! Whether one should also be flying within VLOS, when flying by FPV is a different conversation, but limiting all drone flights to VLOS distance certainly solves the FAA's biggest problem of locating the pilot! Coincidence? I think not!

 

[MacCool]

I generally try to stay within the rules and regulations as written, but my primary focus on flying LOS, or not, is that MY evaluation of the way the flight is conducted indicates that there is no danger to other persons or property.

 

[Flying Alabama]

That is the same standard that Part 107 pilots are held to (Max height
I’d suggest you mount a set of strobes on each motor arm, you would be surprised how much further out you’ll be able to see it. We use the in the utility world and they do make a difference.
The LOS is there to protect manned aircraft, if UAS pilots are having issues with LOS then you can see the issue a pilot in a fixed wing or helicopter would have locating one. I’m sure the isn’t anyone here that would want to be involved in a near miss or cause an accident.

 

[BigAl07]

It might be you have information available to you that others don’t. I can’t see any evidence to suggest identification of pilot location is the principal intent of VLOS requirements. No depth perception, limited FOV, greatly reduced situational awareness and limited opportunity for early identification of a threat as compared to within VLOS operation. Now consider the situation with loss of downlink, even worse the drone diligently following a direct RTH path blindly from a distance perhaps several km distant from the operator. To suggest the VLOS requirement isn’t imposed with the principal intent of safety seems more than a little ridiculous.

Well stated and very accurate. VLOS is for Aviation Safety/Situational Awareness and not intended to "locate the operator". Potentially being able to locate the operator is a side benefit but not the intended reasoning for the requirement.

 

[dgarzoli]

No that is incorrect. Airspace regulations are in place primarily to minimise and manage risk. For example, in the context of this discussion, VLOS related regulations have been mandated regardless of how likely it is in any given situation that an accident will be caused by a drone operator flying BVLOS. For obvious reasons a blanket approach must be taken - that is how all laws work in a civilised society.

You are correct that is the very valid reason for the law. My correct point is that no one is getting a ticket or arrested everytime you lose sight of your drone while flying it. Does the regulation differentiate between ACTUALLY having eyes on it 100% of the time, or just theoretical. I mean, I can SEE the moon, it is within my "visual line of sight" . Can I fly my drone to the moon even though I may not actually see my drone the whole time?

Now, I fly my drone over the ridge that's 50' from where I'm standing- no line of sight, but might be able to throw a rock and hit it?

Not advocating people violate regs, I'm just saying this is all on the honor system, up until you cause an incident.

 

[Johnmcl7]

You are correct that is the very valid reason for the law. My correct point is that no one is getting a ticket or arrested everytime you lose sight of your drone while flying it. Does the regulation differentiate between ACTUALLY having eyes on it 100% of the time, or just theoretical. I mean, I can SEE the moon, it is within my "visual line of sight" . Can I fly my drone to the moon even though I may not actually see my drone the whole time?

Now, I fly my drone over the ridge that's 50' from where I'm standing- no line of sight, but might be able to throw a rock and hit it?

Not advocating people violate regs, I'm just saying this is all on the honor system, up until you cause an incident.

If you flew your done to the moon it would no longer be VLOS because as you say you can't see it, instead it would be BVLOS. If you fly over a ridge and no longer have LOS it doesn't matter if you can hit a rock with it or not, it's clearly not VLOS.

The UK put a limit on VLOS at 500m although if you'd caused an accident because you couldn't see it and it was within that 500m range I'm sure it would be easy to demonstrate.

 

[KScottNZ]

Was that Dustin Dunill (I think)? Landed/crashed in the grass just the wrong side of the wall. I like that one

No, SkyHighFilms in Europe.

 

[old man mavic]

i think the whole subject of VLOS is going the same way as the height above ground level debate ,we all know and have probably experienced times when at some point in a flight we have been unable to see our drone, or because we were at a high take off point when we took off and then flew out over a valley we were higher than 400ft AGL i know i have, but these moments were not done with disregard for the rules and unless there was someone who was able to take me to task, or i had crashed and caused harm to someone or something, then i have concluded my flight without incident,it is very easy to break the rules without even realising it sometimes ,and there is a vast difference to that, and deliberately flouting them ,and if i was ever in the position to be prosecuted for breaking them, then i would have to take the punishment that was metered out to me

 

[deleted member 877]

You are correct that is the very valid reason for the law. My correct point is that no one is getting a ticket or arrested everytime you lose sight of your drone while flying it. Does the regulation differentiate between ACTUALLY having eyes on it 100% of the time, or just theoretical. I mean, I can SEE the moon, it is within my "visual line of sight" . Can I fly my drone to the moon even though I may not actually see my drone the whole time?

Now, I fly my drone over the ridge that's 50' from where I'm standing- no line of sight, but might be able to throw a rock and hit it?

Not advocating people violate regs, I'm just saying this is all on the honor system, up until you cause an incident.

Well, obviously that is because drone operators are not all under 24/7 surveillance. And if you care to do the research the airspace regulators fully understand that you can't be having eyes on the drone 100% of the time because you need to be able to look at the RC to change settings etc. But they do expect that you will be able to reacquire VLOS when you're finished looking at the RC.

Apart from that I am struggling to understated the point of your reference to flying your drone to the moon. In regard to flying over a ridge the drone will disconnect from the RC and either fly away or return to home depending on what make/model you're flying. And how does being able to throw a rock over the ridge and maybe being able to hit the drone make any sense in this context?

 

[Phantomrain.org]

Maybe this has already be presented, but just in case, here it is:

My Mavic 2Z has a body roughly 0.25 ft wide. This is the most visible part when flying away or toward the pilot. Now the accepted angular resolution of the human eye is about 1/60 degree or 0.000291 radian.
Calculations:
Distance X Angle (in radians) = Arc length
Distance X 0.000921 = 0.25 ft whence distance = 859 ft or 0.16 mile.

Now even if we up the angular resolution of your eye by a factor of 4, we get about .064 mile straight line.

Note: if the drone is at h=300 ft, the horizontal distance is 804 ft.

I challenge anyone to let someone fly your drone out somewhere randomly to a distance of, say 0.64 mile, while you keep your back turned and then you turn around and see the drone.

Who flies their Mavic 2 drone no farther than 1000 feet? As for myself, I have trouble seeing it four or five hundred feet away.

1500 ft in white skies is very doable without any extras , however as a nod to you , if you do take your eyes off the drone , you wont be able to find it. But that is what RTH is for a quick orientation and visual line of sight.

Phantomrain.org
Gear to fly in the rain !
coal

 

[dronerdave]

I think Rec rules are a bit different (than 107 rules) and will continuing to change since the new laws were put into effect a few months back. A few years ago the FAA only suggested following CBO rules as a Rec PIC, and although one can argue the FAA didn't say "AMA", that is where some of these rules came from. That is also where a lot these long distance and height records came out of...many saying there was no "FAA" rule that specifically said you can't go BVLOS or above 400'. Now that has changed but a lot of people don't like it...some might not even know they are violating a law by flying too high or out of sight. I've had some multirotor hobbyists tell me they don't follow AMA rules and have no intentions of ever following them. There are a few exceptions but Rec flight never really became a problem until FPV came about along with the almost autonomous aircraft platforms that started to appear. Trying to fly your RC airplane or Heli BVLOS usually resulted in a crashed aircraft so nobody in their right mind tried it. Seems like technology simply ran over the FAA and now the slow moving government is trying to catch up. I not saying the FAA and government aren't overreacting because in some cases they are, but keeping the NAS safe is the priority and it's up to them to control it.
This is from a FAA link:
Until the FAA establishes the criteria and process and begins recognizing CBOs, it cannot coordinate the development of safety guidelines. Accordingly, no recognized CBOs or coordinated safety guidelines currently exist, as contemplated by section 44809(a)(2). Additionally, the FAA acknowledges that aeromodelling organizations have developed safety guidelines that are helpful to recreational flyers. The FAA has determined that it is in the public interest to reasonably interpret this condition to allow recreational unmanned aircraft operations under the exception while the FAA implements all statutory conditions. The alternative would be to prohibit these operations or to require all operators of recreational unmanned aircraft to obtain a remote pilot certificate under 14 CFR part 107 and comply with the part 107 operating rules. Accordingly, to facilitate continued recreational unmanned aircraft operations during the implementation process, the FAA finds that operations conducted in accordance with existing safety guidelines of an aeromodelling organization satisfy this condition, provided those guidelines do not conflict with the other statutory conditions of section 44809(a).

I fly fixed wing RC aircraft on a weekly basis and don't have a problem with the AMA type rules the FAA recently put out. However they are very basic, and somewhat black and white. On the flight line we all know that from time to time you must look at your transmitter to check certain stats. I'd like to them grandfather in some of the older AMA rules that have been time tested as safe to use in the NAS but overall only time will tell how they deal with multirotors. I'll admit I spend much more time with my eyes on the screen than looking at my Mavic as it travels. I think I'd crash it if I didn't keep monitoring the stats closely. Currently I keep VLOS via Arc2 strobes...well until the FAA says I can't use them to keep in VLOS.

 

[rob levine]

Very good points, the problem is we bring more on us by posting this stuff. Think about it. Nobody goes to a driving forum and asks speed limit really? We sit here wondering about new laws on a regular bases and it’s truely stuff like this ends up in search engines It really isn’t back and forth rule. Can’t see it bring it back.

I disagree. The FAA used VLOS and not some actual number of feet as the criteria for a reason. Sometimes it can be difficult to suss that out - so it's good for pilots to share their experiences. I personally don't like going more than 800' with the Mavic and like 1,200' with the Inspire.

 

[Mavic 57]

Its not about being able to see a tiny flashing strobe in the distance, its about being able to see other manned aircraft that we need to avoid at all costs.

 

[Endeavor]

The reality is VLOS is a dream. In general during a mission the drone is lost from sight and the real observations are done via screen display. It is so true all the posts on max distance of 4 or 5 miles and where is the VLOS. In reality 100 feet behind trees or around building and the drone is an invisible object only viewable via app. Its winter and below freezing are you really going to stand in the cold or sit in your warm car and do your flight over some farmland? I think the real key is knowing where the drone is in relation to you and is it in a spot where no harm can come to others. I do rural real estate and 90% of the time I can't see the bird, I may hear it but not see it due to cover or sun. Most footage is at 300 to 400 feet so I can get a good view of parcels of land. And yes most is done with me sitting in my truck to protect me from the cold and screen from the sun. The only time VLOS actually matters is in a damage suit or among those who wish to be the drone police. There is the fantasy world and the real world.

 

[bimmer7]

I don't see this being any different from the speed limit. Even a Toyota Yaris can go higher than the speed limit. The issue of VLOS is a mute point. BVLOS legislation is similar to unlimited speed limit on certain roads. Later you will have area that you can go faster (farther) than others. As the technology improves, more BVLOS enacted.

 

[Rquirk]

Agree I don’t see the sense behind this rule. Using the camera is the best way of seeing where you are. If an aircraft were approaching, you would see and hear it long before it reached your position so plenty of time to drop to 50 feet or so. I flew submersibles for twenty years and the only way to do that is from what the rov sees. You get used to putting yourself on the rov. You become aware of everything around you.

 

[PheadJack]

Maybe this has already be presented, but just in case, here it is:

My Mavic 2Z has a body roughly 0.25 ft wide. This is the most visible part when flying away or toward the pilot. Now the accepted angular resolution of the human eye is about 1/60 degree or 0.000291 radian.
Calculations:
Distance X Angle (in radians) = Arc length
Distance X 0.000921 = 0.25 ft whence distance = 859 ft or 0.16 mile.

Now even if we up the angular resolution of your eye by a factor of 4, we get about .064 mile straight line.

Note: if the drone is at h=300 ft, the horizontal distance is 804 ft.

I challenge anyone to let someone fly your drone out somewhere randomly to a distance of, say 0.64 mile, while you keep your back turned and then you turn around and see the drone.

Who flies their Mavic 2 drone no farther than 1000 feet? As for myself, I have trouble seeing it four or five hundred feet away.

In the initial flight practice training class our team took, we flew the little flying squirrels about 1500 ft out. they were pretty much gone at that point. the only clue was rotating the drone to see the light flare on reflective parts and we could barely make out the safety lights.
If you added one of those flashing dome light packs it would probably be ok, but that guy is really small at any significant distance.

 

[theDRONEranger]

So, is it safe to say that if I fly my drone to a max take off Alt of 400’, then fly a straight and level flight for 3 miles, I have violated the the max alt for where the DRONE is, due to curvature of the earth. Just thinking! Cause if I fly straight and level at 400’ Alt for a distance of 3 miles and the Alt remains at 400’, then I just proved the Flat Earth Theory!
As Vinny Barbarino said, “I’m so confused!”

Today’s idiot break has been brought to you by today’s . . .

Happy Holidays to all my fellow droners!

 

[Walter Lea]

In South Africa we don't have such problems as this... as long as we dont fly near airports and Harbours and Prisons we ok... We can fly as much as we want and there's been no cases and headaches... We Fly Free and as far as the DJi Goggles can see... Just saying. Fly Safe and Enjoy!

 

[MavBoka]

That’s why I use four of the Firehouse ARC2s.... massively increased LOS visibility, especially in the golden hours.

I also us my four firehouse strobes and I have no trouble seeing my drone to 1500 to 2000’ especially if it’s cloudy or twilight