Low flying helicopters in UK

[IslandBarnDave]

I’m hoping someone in the UK can help. I have had 3 instances of Chinook helicopters flying well below 100m over my home in the past few months, the last one just last week. This morning an electricity company helicopter low flew over, presumably checking overhead power lines. In none of those cases was I flying my MA2 but I could have been which could have been disastrous. I’m not in a NFZ normally, near an airport etc. I have many tall trees on my land so typically fly between 50-100m to maintain VLOS at a distance.

So my question is how do I find out if one of these is scheduled to fly over before I launch my drone? Or do I just rely on my ears?

 

[old man mavic]

@IslandBarnDave it is very difficult to actually judge the real height ,of a full sized manned aircraft flying overhead,and even if those chinooks were at 500ft plus ,then they appear to be much lower as the pass over ,to be honest ,your eyes and ears are probably going to be best to avoid anything low flying this is why VLOS is important ,

 

[FlyBackOU812]

This is a great discussion and one I can contribute to with video of my own experience with a very low flying huge military helicopter that came out of nowhere seemingly and very fast,, **** near chopped my little mini into a thousand pieces. You can hear me stating that same thing in the screen recording. Its been a couple years ish so its gonna take some time to find because back then i never captioned my videos and have close to a terabyte of drone video on like 20 different SD cards. The pilot was definitely right at or possibly even under 200 foot. He shouldn't have been any lower than 400. I was at about 250 altitude straight above my head and almost **** myself when it happened. I'll see what I can do to find the video

 

[Johnmcl7]

@IslandBarnDave it is very difficult to actually judge the real height ,of a full sized manned aircraft flying overhead,and even if those chinooks were at 500ft plus ,then they appear to be much lower as the pass over ,to be honest ,your eyes and ears are probably going to be best to avoid anything low flying this is why VLOS is important ,

I agree on both points, I think they're not as low as they look (even though they can shake the house when they fly over here) but any time I can hear a helicopter at all I just get the drone down fast to make sure.

 

[TnDronePilot]

I live in the US and recently posted a similar question about perceived height of helicopters that fly over my house. Now for me, I can hear them coming plus if I were flying, I'd get the warning on my screen since I have the MA2. I could swear sometimes they fly very close to 400ft AGL and I've even used two different live aircraft tracking apps to see their calibrated altitude. My house is 1056ft MSL and in the FlightRadar24 app, I usually see LifeStar helicopters flying between 1800-2300ft calibrated altitude which I'm assuming is adjusted for MSL and not AGL as I would definitely be able to see it if they were 1800ft AGL. So if I'm doing this right, I subtract 1056 from 1800 to get the actual altitude over my neighborhood which is 744ft. This is where I felt the app was lying to me as they look a heck of a lot closer to the drone's 400ft flight and not another 344ft higher. This is when MP members here explained to me that our brain and eyes can really mess with our depth perception especially when we're dealing with two objects that are of very different scale.

 

[Deleted member 133794]

It is very difficult to judge height and distance as mentioned above,
but the thing to remember is that these helicopters planes ect are
technically allowed to fly lower than our maximum 400ft height in
certain situations which is why VLOS is soooooo important so as a
UA operator you can quickly and efficiently get out of their way. Also
to remember here in the UK the MA2 doesn't come equipped with the
AIRSENCE alert system on them. Keep um peeled ? and listen out ?

 

[IslandBarnDave]

I get the point about perspective generally but it certainly doesn’t apply in the case of the electric company. My wife caught it on video: it is definitely flying no more than 10m above the wires. She swears the Chinook wasn’t higher either but we don’t have that on video.

It’s the smaller helicopter that’s the most concerning really. You hear a Chinook from miles away but not the smaller one. The Chinook flew over once, the smaller one several times, the first time out of nowhere and quite fast. Given the height I would have been flying and the number of trees on my land, even if I’d heard it and reacted quickly dropping height suddenly could easily cost me my drone for which I’m sure there would be no comeback from the electric company.

My point, I suppose, is that with the increased prevalence of drones and the new rules we need to follow it seems to me there should be some rules for manned (non emergency) aircraft too. So they should need to register on a CAA site if they intend to fly below 120m and we drone fliers could check that site before taking off. Makes sense to me anyway. I can always see my drone and the airspace immediately around it but I’m not looking behind me... and what if I was deaf?

 

[FlyBackOU812]

I get the point about perspective generally but it certainly doesn’t apply in the case of the electric company. My wife caught it on video: it is definitely flying no more than 10m above the wires. She swears the Chinook wasn’t higher either but we don’t have that on video.

It’s the smaller helicopter that’s the most concerning really. You hear a Chinook from miles away but not the smaller one. The Chinook flew over once, the smaller one several times, the first time out of nowhere and quite fast. Given the height I would have been flying and the number of trees on my land, even if I’d heard it and reacted quickly dropping height suddenly could easily cost me my drone for which I’m sure there would be no comeback from the electric company.

My point, I suppose, is that with the increased prevalence of drones and the new rules we need to follow it seems to me there should be some rules for manned (non emergency) aircraft too. So they should need to register on a CAA site if they intend to fly below 120m and we drone fliers could check that site before taking off. Makes sense to me anyway. I can always see my drone and the airspace immediately around it but I’m not looking behind me... and what if I was deaf?ith the huge military helo I was referring to in my previous comment in this thread wasn't

In my case with the huge helicopter that almost chewed up and spit my mini out, there was no misperception. Where I was, and I live only 3 miles from where I was that night, is on the edge of a huge military base where there is normally literally hundreds of military jets that fly very low daily doing touch and go pilot training and are so loud when going over my house you have to stop talking or pause your TV if watching a show cuz you can't hear the person next to you even yelling. So your ears and brain get used to it and desensitizes you to those sounds so listening out for one coming is very difficult. More so than anyone could know unless they lived under the direct path of an Airforce training runway as I do. Once I heard it, it was basically directly above me. I even felt the pressure change in the air as the sound hit me. Made me want to duck my head down it was so low. just barely above the tree tops. It's very obvious in the video I have

 

[old man mavic]

the electricity inspection helis are low i agree, but they tend to follow the power lines anyway ,so just make sure you are not flying near them

 

[IslandBarnDave]

the electricity inspection helis are low i agree, but they tend to follow the power lines anyway ,so just make sure you are not flying near them

That’s common sense. So your advice is that despite flying within the code, if another aircraft enters our space (VLOS, sub 120m) and an incident ensues it’s our responsibility and there is no way of finding out prior to take-off whether such aircraft could be coming our way. Sounds crazy to me.

 

[Edh]

I live on the Atlantic. Flying from my beach house is very cool but you have to keep your head on a swivel. The beach or just off the beach is a Naval Pilot play ground not to mention helicopters, planes pulling banners, kite surfers, ultra lights. It keeps you very busy. The nicer the day, the more the traffic.

 

[couplands]

I recently took the free UAVhub A2CofC course UAVHub A2 C of C - Bridge Page , one of the sections cover low flying aircraft and military aircraft along with resources where you can check for possible flight locations. Well worth doing the course, even if you don't take the exam as its got loads of useful info. One story that Matt Williams tells of his days as a military pilot is the effect of a collision between his Puma and something that weighed 1.5kg (similar to a Mavic 2 Pro)...very sobering..!

I would hope that if helicopters are flying in your area for other than emergency reasons, then NOTAMs would be worth checking. Near me (in the Peak District) there was a NOTAM for helicopter flights for a week where they were repairing footpaths around Kinder using underslung carry bags. The airspace that was noted was from ground level to 2500ft.

 

[Deleted member 133794]

I recently took the free UAVhub A2CofC course UAVHub A2 C of C - Bridge Page , one of the sections cover low flying aircraft and military aircraft along with resources where you can check for possible flight locations. Well worth doing the course, even if you don't take the exam as its got loads of useful info. One story that Matt Williams tells of his days as a military pilot is the effect of a collision between his Puma and something that weighed 1.5kg (similar to a Mavic 2 Pro)...very sobering..!

I would hope that if helicopters are flying in your area for other than emergency reasons, then NOTAMs would be worth checking. Near me (in the Peak District) there was a NOTAM for helicopter flights for a week where they were repairing footpaths around Kinder using underslung carry bags. The airspace that was noted was from ground level to 2500ft.

i think the collision was between the Puma and a bird ( it's online) yes very
sobering. Again VLOS soooo important.

 

[couplands]

i think the collision was between the Puma and a bird ( it's online) yes very
sobering. Again VLOS soooo important.

It was, although I didn't want to give the story away..;-)

Amazing what damage such a relatively small object can do to a helicopter and certainly gives food for thought. If in doubt when flying a drone and you hear an aircraft, get it on the deck or out of the way asap.

 

[Lets Fly]

I live near an airport just far enough away that I can fly in my neighborhood. We have a lot of small planes and Jets coming in often. I am always trying to judge the altitude. Jets are easy because I check my phone and get all that information if they have transponders and Small jets are always higher than lighter aircraft. For the smaller ones like Cessna's I found out that the tire size depending on the rim can be 18 to 21 inches wide. My M2Z is 12 inches across the front and at 400 ft when I compare that to the larger tire of the small aircraft I can tell the planes are always much higher. When I picture my drone next to the tire I can see that the drone would appear much smaller then it appears at 400 feet. The tires on the plane always appear smaller than the drone, meaning it must be higher. Not sure if I explained that well, but it works for me.

 

[Deleted member 133794]

I live near an airport just far enough away that I can fly in my neighborhood. We have a lot of small planes and Jets coming in often. I am always trying to judge the altitude. Jets are easy because I check my phone and get all that information if they have transponders and Small jets are always higher than lighter aircraft. For the smaller ones like Cessna's I found out that the tire size depending on the rim can be 18 to 21 inches wide. My M2Z is 12 inches across the front and at 400 ft when I compare that to the larger tire of the small aircraft I can tell the planes are always much higher. When I picture my drone next to the tire I can see that the drone would appear much smaller then it appears at 400 feet. The tires on the plane always appear smaller than the drone, meaning it must be higher. Not sure if I explained that well, but it works for me.

You explained it perfectly...?? sounds like a good solution, providing you
don't get younger pilots PIMPING their planes and changing the wheel size
???

 

[IslandBarnDave]

I recently took the free UAVhub A2CofC course UAVHub A2 C of C - Bridge Page , one of the sections cover low flying aircraft and military aircraft along with resources where you can check for possible flight locations. Well worth doing the course, even if you don't take the exam as its got loads of useful info. One story that Matt Williams tells of his days as a military pilot is the effect of a collision between his Puma and something that weighed 1.5kg (similar to a Mavic 2 Pro)...very sobering..!

I would hope that if helicopters are flying in your area for other than emergency reasons, then NOTAMs would be worth checking. Near me (in the Peak District) there was a NOTAM for helicopter flights for a week where they were repairing footpaths around Kinder using underslung carry bags. The airspace that was noted was from ground level to 2500ft.

Doing the UAVHub A2 C of C is definitely on my To Do list. Good shout about the NOTAMs too - how do I check for those?

 

[couplands]

Doing the UAVHub A2 C of C is definitely on my To Do list. Good shout about the NOTAMs too - how do I check for those?

Do the course I linked too, its free until you take the exam and its got all the links to the various safety apps/web sites etc. Well worth doing, Matt Williams is a great teacher - he's been there and done it in the real thing. The training is video based so easy to follow. Some others I have done are a lot of reading which doesnt work for me.

The NOTAMs and other flight safty data can be found using the NATS - Drone Assist app or websites Safety Apps - Dronesafe

 

[Deleted member 133794]

Doing the UAVHub A2 C of C is definitely on my To Do list. Good shout about the NOTAMs too - how do I check for those?

notaminfo.com

 

[IslandBarnDave]

Aha! So just got a letter from my local power company telling me they’re cutting off my power one day next week to trim trees including my willow that is right under the wires. Good job I’ve got a generator!