This is why neighbors don't want your drone near their homes

TRYKRB · Sep 16, 2017

Misdemeanor. Pfft. Who gives a flying ****.

Kate · Sep 17, 2017

Rotorman said:
I think every country is paranoid with the small but real risk of paedophiles and other people who have bad intentions. There are and will unfortunately be sick people in this world but its a shame that a lot of innocent well meaning UAV operators get blamed for being one of them..

lol who said anything about paedophiles?

Kilrah · Sep 17, 2017

TreeburnerCT said:
Stupid to be hovering outside a building especially facing the windows, even if he wasn't up to no good that just looks bad.

Given the "had to go recover it" he most likely screwed up and got stuck there due to a mix of signal loss and obstacle avoidance instead of doing it intentionally.

Slate · Sep 17, 2017

Look, do as if most people do when in a compromising position.....close the shade on the window! I used to live in nyc and to my suprise nearly everyone had a pair of binoculars. Im not at all exusing him if he was peeping, but im tired of every neighbor thinking the drones are peeping. I now live in Nj, & I was recently hovering over my own yard, about 150ft, taking sunset pictures. I was trying to get that perfect golden shot as the sun dropped behind the horizon. After about 10min, the neighbor on the block behind me started yelling and cursing to stop peeping on him! I yelled back, im peeping the sunset you ***! Honestly i blame the media for the public paranioa.

Hollow Dog · Sep 17, 2017

If you have a phone and or computer or a bank account the least of your concerns is a UAV the NSA has you covered.

L.L. · Sep 17, 2017

Hollow Dog said:
If you have a phone and or computer or a bank account the least of your concerns is a UAV the NSA has you covered.

We also forget that some of these folks have an inflated sense of self-importance.

gnirtS · Sep 17, 2017

Forget the potential legal aspects here for the moment - its a simple issue of responsible behaviour so as not to annoy people.
Drones are noisy and people dislike and distrust them. So a little common sense from users in NOT flying their toy in such a way as to cause annoyance would go a long way to reducing friction between drone and non drone groups and also go a way towards stopping the ever increasing regulation of flying worldwide. Just because legally you CAN do something doesn't mean you SHOULD. Its all about playing nice with other groups of people.

Kate · Sep 17, 2017

gnirtS said:
Forget the potential legal aspects here for the moment - its a simple issue of responsible behaviour so as not to annoy people.
Drones are noisy and people dislike and distrust them. So a little common sense from users in NOT flying their toy in such a way as to cause annoyance would go a long way to reducing friction between drone and non drone groups and also go a way towards stopping the ever increasing regulation of flying worldwide. Just because legally you CAN do something doesn't mean you SHOULD. Its all about playing nice with other groups of people.

You came up with that all by yourself?

Bite BayKon · Sep 17, 2017

If you have problems with people accusing you of 'spying' maybe you should refer them to these YouTube posts. Not scientific, but certainly food for thought !

Longer version:

or maybe:

Now THIS is Spying:

TRYKRB · Sep 17, 2017

FAA rules protect drone pilots from this kind of crap. My answer in court would be:
Prove it.

Lapeer20m said:
The reality is that to really get a good high quality view of a person, a mavic has to be within about 10 feet. Flying within 10 feet of a window 40 feet up and who knows how far from the RC is quite risky. Plus many windows have a reflective coating that makes it difficult to see through them at various angles.....my guess is that the drone was somewhere within 50 feet of the building and someone overreacted about a "drone with a camera affixed to it" possibly spying on them.

TRYKRB · Sep 17, 2017

And then I'd sue the **** out of that vain ***** for wrongful prosecution and defamation.

Amit Kl · Jun 19, 2023

Hello all
This was actually me in this article.

A very unpleasant experience for an out of the country tourist.
I was flying my drone for some city skyline footage when it lost its connection and “went back home”
Instead of using the original path home it took the fastest one and got stuck at a balcony because of the glass wall. It stood there for minutes while I was trying to regain connection and control by walking closer to its last known location.

While it was landing due to low battery it sent its last location and I was going around the building to try and find it when eventually I went into the buildings lobby and asked the person at the front desk if they had seen a drone, this is when all of the above started..

I have never taken any pictures of people, nor did I take pictures of her or her family like she was accusing, other than apologizing many times, I have also offered to share with her the footage of what I did do that day and give her the memory card just for sake of mind, this resulted in nothing.

At the end, this case got completely dismissed at court, but now whenever I travel to the US I always have to go through a very unpleasant experience of interviews and long wait times in airport back rooms

Happy to answer any of your questions

MAvic_South_Oz · Jun 19, 2023

Amit Kl said:
Hello all
This was actually me in this article.

Well Amit, welcome to he forum and sorry that happened to you.
I guess mistakes can be made when flying, especially in urban areas where signal loss can be much more risky due to buildings and other such.

What gets me is how can someone even think someone is taking photos when they might see a drone nearby ?
Most would have trouble even telling which way it is facing !!

Glad the case was dismissed for you, but terrible having to deal with the consequences on what sounds like frequent US visits.

karlblessing · Jun 21, 2023

Amit Kl said:
Instead of using the original path home it took the fastest one

That's by design, it ascends to the RTH height (if it's lower than the one set), and b-lines it for the home point. Least that's how it is for most of the modern models.

At least obstacle avoidance was on, otherwise it would have just smacked into the building due to not setting a proper RTH height. I am not aware of any current DJI drones that will take a flight path back to home.

mavic3usa · Jun 21, 2023

karlblessing said:
That's by design, it ascends to the RTH height (if it's lower than the one set), and b-lines it for the home point. Least that's how it is for most of the modern models.

At least obstacle avoidance was on, otherwise it would have just smacked into the building due to not setting a proper RTH height. I am not aware of any current DJI drones that will take a flight path back to home.

I believe once upon a time (before my time) there was a drone that would return home using the same path that it got there, no sure what model. Also the Mavic 3 take a bit of a different path when returning to home by relying on OA.

Instead of hovering in front of a building until the battery dies, why can't the drone go around the building?

karlblessing · Jun 21, 2023

mavic3usa said:
I believe once upon a time (before my time) there was a drone that would return home using the same path that it got there, no sure what model. Also the Mavic 3 take a bit of a different path when returning to home by relying on OA.

Instead of hovering in front of a building until the battery dies, why can't the drone go around the building?

Mavic 3 still b lines home, but uses OA to help avoid certain obstacles.

Depending on the model (such as the Air 2s) the manual goes into great detail on how it utilizes OA when doing return to home. It can take a lot of battery and time if the RTH isn't set higher than all the obstacles between destination and home (basically... don't fly beyond visual line of sight). It does it in steps too.

OA course won't work if the environment has too low a lighting, and RTH may fail if it's too close to the edge of controlled airspace.

lookout · Jun 21, 2023

karlblessing said:
Mavic 3 still b lines home, but uses OA to help avoid certain obstacles.

Depending on the model (such as the Air 2s) the manual goes into great detail on how it utilizes OA when doing return to home. It can take a lot of battery and time if the RTH isn't set higher than all the obstacles between destination and home (basically... don't fly beyond visual line of sight). It does it in steps too.

OA course won't work if the environment has too low a lighting, and RTH may fail if it's too close to the edge of controlled airspace.

The original mavic pros would use oa on rth as long as it wasn't in sport mode. But then there was the sun being seen as an obstacle as well.
If you ever have any question what the highest obstacle is in a given area there is the big number followed by the small number in the grid on a sectional. Not that it would be all that useful most of the time (or that you can get your drone that high).