New pilot who got confronted when flying, I need to check I'm in the right here.

[Cymru]

Personally, I try to fly in places that have few people in the area, to avoid confrontations.

The theory is great but its amazing the effort some people will go to in order to have a confrontation.

I watched a guy take just under 5 minutes to walk 500m over wet tidal sand on an otherwise deserted beach just to tell me cant fly there.
(Spoiler - i could).

 

[boomeroj]

Yeah that's what I normally do. On reflection I feel what happened is this very small community of maybe 4 or 5 houses occasionally they must have had some drone hobbyists in the area and for whatever reason they didn't take kindly to it.

Do you know where in Inverness I can get new propellers? We are visiting and I broke one. Thanks

 

[karlblessing]

I feel like what everyone said is pretty much on the mark, having recent knowledge and being able to show that recent information (breifly) helps a lot. Some folks either have misinformation or outdated information.

Recently flew a county park here in Michigan and had some bird watcher trying to tell me it was illegal to fly there. It may have been at one point that various counties tried to ban drones from not only flying but also taking off/landing, but Michigan state courts superceded them and said they did not have jurisdiction to change state law regarding the matter.

Course I still didn't take off despite my information, mainly because I asked what birds he was checking out and he pointed out a bald eagle probably 100 feet from us and that was enough for me to decide to take off quite a bit elsewhere. I'll take my chances with ill informed guests or authorities, but not birds of prey.

 

[lookout]

I feel like what everyone said is pretty much on the mark, having recent knowledge and being able to show that recent information (breifly) helps a lot. Some folks either have misinformation or outdated information.

Recently flew a county park here in Michigan and had some bird watcher trying to tell me it was illegal to fly there. It may have been at one point that various counties tried to ban drones from not only flying but also taking off/landing, but Michigan state courts superceded them and said they did not have jurisdiction to change state law regarding the matter.

Course I still didn't take off despite my information, mainly because I asked what birds he was checking out and he pointed out a bald eagle probably 100 feet from us and that was enough for me to decide to take off quite a bit elsewhere. I'll take my chances with ill informed guests or authorities, but not birds of prey.

The birds of prey have found your drone to be a nice little appetizer. The bird of prey probably would win 9 out of 10 times against the drone.

 

[WWF]

Hi I'm a bit of a new pilot and had a bit of an unfortunate incident today.

I was flying in Red castle near Inverness today the weather was clear and no wind. I took off from a small car park (public land) and flew out and over the water, at some point a fellow who I think was sitting near by said "I wasn't allowed to fly within 50m of people". I explained my drone was less than 250g and hence was able to fly within 50m of people. He then grumbled that I was disturbing the peace and walked off, I put it down to someone who has a hatred of drones and moved on. I was conscious of the people there and felt like I kept a good respectable from them, although most likely may not have been always greater 50m but I felt I was not causing a nusicane.

Shortly after another unrelated man then shouted at me that I was "breaking the law". He said he had prior spoken to the police and drone flying was not allowed here due to the proximity to the houses and it scaring the horses. I explained to him there is no regulations stopping me since my drone was less than 250g and there is no restrictions from flying in this area (I triple checked this but if anyone knows different please let me know) and since I was approximately 100m from the horses at take off (and no closer) I suspect they wouldn't even be aware of it. He also mentioned I was not allowed to fly near at the near the castle either since it was a historic site. Again after looking into this I see no such regulations or requirement for permission but again I could be wrong.

After he approached me I said I would to stop flying since I don't want to antagonise him but informed him I believed (and still do) I was well within my rights to fly here. Annoyingly I didn't have the CAA site handy to show him because I believe he is quoting old regulations before the 250g limit got introduced.

Since I'm a new pilot i'm a bit raw and I can't help but feel I got a bit bullied from flying there by a couple of guys who seem to dislike drones. Still I want to check that I'm not misinterpreting the rules or otherwise was mistaken.

I just returned from Milos, Greece where i flew quite a bit. The coolest places to fly always had a lot of people, and if you wanted the water to be that awesome blue color you have to fly when the sun is higher. I would hike a ways a way from the popular area and then fly straight up and away to reduce how much noise i made. i have noise reduction props but the rock cliffs seemed to amplify the angry bee noise quite a bit. So i would stay high to shoot and then when i landed i would bring it right overhead and bring it in straight down. Nobody hassled me. However, there were a couple of instances where other disrespectul drone pilots were flying/hovering right over the people resulting in some angry shouts and gestures. One was over a nude beach! I was half expecting someone with a decent arm taking down one of them with a flip flop or water bottle or something. I gotta say i would have laughed.

 

[MAvic_South_Oz]

I was half expecting someone with a decent arm taking down one of them with a flip flop or water bottle or something.

Flip flop, a good description for where the word thong can be misconstrued due to different country’s use of the term.

 

[Cymru]

I'm generally of the view that if a person can take down a drone with a flip-flop or water bottle, the drone is being flown too close to those people.

 

[Cymru]

I just returned from Milos, Greece where i flew quite a bit. The coolest places to fly always had a lot of people, and if you wanted the water to be that awesome blue color you have to fly when the sun is higher.

Is worth noting that almost all of Milos is a no-fly zone.

https://dagr.hcaa.gr/#map_page=

 

[Mavic Merrick]

Sounds to me like a some complete drone hating Karen’s (DHK)s. I have a few in my neighborhood but I just ignore them.
Happy Flying!

 

[YVRGUY]

I don't have much to offer in terms of drone regulations in Scotland, but I applaud you for handling those potentially volatile situations with calm and dignity. Good on you.

Ditto to MS Coast’s reply.

I just read Old Man Mavic’s reply to this post. My take is, the majority of drone pilots out there are responsible with respect to the rules and regulations involving the public. There are those “Karen’s” and “Darens” out there that just want to confront you for the sake of being obnoxious. There are also those people who may confront you for buzzing around too close to their homes or too close to a popular tourist attraction on a regular basis. These people do have legit privacy and safety concerns. What most of them don’t have is any knowledge of the flying regs and rules.

I was a biker and jet ski owner operator in my earlier days. I was responsible and enjoyed a love for their speed and handling capabilities out in the wide open areas. I gave up both loves due to the high insurance costs, the lack of respect on both the water and road from other autos and boats. I did not have to scratch my head hard as to why all this was making my life miserable . It was that small minority of irresponsible jet skiers and motorcyclists that brought the hate and disrespect upon the responsible majority. I can’t count the number of times when safely beaching my jet ski someone would make a disparaging remark about “you guys”…you know the rest. The latter all happening while another jet skier is speeding towards the shore through a crowd of swimmers and waders

Karen’s and Darens have been around for ages, but, so have legit, concerned, and caring bystanders who on the whole are more interested in drones rather than ridding them.

Cool heads DO prevail and that’s all we can do, is to stay cool. Avoiding conflict works best. Again, good on you.

PS…thank you for letting me vent on this topic…we can promote a better culture of pilots if we work at it.

 

[highflyeressex]

you could of reversed on them and said by the way as your are interfering with my flying you are in fact breaking the law not me as it is endangering aircraft