Drones, overreaction or justified?

The regulations are already sufficient. There are tons of rules about where and when you can fly. Unfortunately, people aren't aware of them and there is no enforcement. People think they can fly wherever and whenever they want. They can't!
What we need is better awareness, more enforcement, and maybe a simple exam on the regs before you are allowed to fly to make sure the pilot is aware.

As some have said already, the main vendor of consumer drones is DJI and they have implemented no-fly-zones on their more modern craft where the drone won't even take off if within one. The zones around airports are huge.
Unfortunately, if it's an older device or one the user hasn't updated in the past year then it won't have these zones.
 
You're running a business using drones and you didn't know that?!

It's a nice government cash cow.

I don't have a drone, so never looked into it. Where did I say I am using drones for my business?

I merely said I want one to use, I never said I have one to use, as in I am thinking about getting one in the future…..I think you totally got the wrong end of the stick.
 
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The regulations are already sufficient. There are tons of rules about where and when you can fly. Unfortunately, people aren't aware of them and there is no enforcement. People think they can fly wherever and whenever they want. They can't!
What we need is better awareness, more enforcement, and maybe a simple exam on the regs before you are allowed to fly to make sure the pilot is aware.

I think enforcement is a key point. There are many users who know the law and just don't care because they know it's not enforced or potentially enforceable.
 
I do agree with the fact that it should be mandatory to register your drone. and that it should have an identifier so that it can be traced back to the owner if it's in an area that it shouldn't have been. Us responsible fliers wouldn't have anything to worry about, but at the moment, it's the 0.0001% of bad pilots spoiling it for the 99.9999% of responsible pilots.
 
I do agree with the fact that it should be mandatory to register your drone. and that it should have an identifier so that it can be traced back to the owner if it's in an area that it shouldn't have been. Us responsible fliers wouldn't have anything to worry about, but at the moment, it's the 0.0001% of bad pilots spoiling it for the 99.9999% of responsible pilots.
Through my experience the percentage of bad pilots is much higher. Take a sample of the posters in the drone thread on here and that'll be borne out.
 
Anti-UAV system

The problem is that commercially available drones can cause problems for miles outside of the confines of airports. I think much tighter rules regarding the sale of drones would be the answer, unfortunately Pandora's box has already been opened and countless ignoramuses who are happy to operate them outside of the law already own them.
 
Had a drone hovering over our garden today at about 15m.

Solution - every drone must flash out a unique reg code using its nav lights as well as on wifi. That code is registered to the user.

If I film the drone on my mobile the code can be obtained by the police and the owner fined. Equally if the drone is in restricted airspace the wifi code can be used to trace the owner at greater range.

Any drone not conforming to these rules is illegal and can be confiscated.

Lol, never gonna work.
 
10 years prison is the same for everyone, whether you are rich or poor.



I did not know that….does that apply to Youtubers???

And this is where things can get silly. Take Canada for example. The law says that you can't fully a drone within 5km of an airport and you need a licence to fly a drone for commercial work (which is almost impossible to get). Seems reasonable right?

Except "airport" is any location designated for landing an aircraft - a major airport, a helicopter pad, a random grass strip used once a year, an open patch of ground designated as a landing pad for helicopters and commercial use is included everything from paid work to shoot video and photos to YouTube to even putting on social media, pretty much if anyone else sees it it's considered "commercial".

So what do people do? They just ignore the law because it's frankly ridiculous. It means people can't show videos on their social media, it means people can't even test their drone is working in their garden, it means much of the south of Canada is essentially a no drone zone. For example in my area I'd technically have to drive a couple of hours before I could find anything more than a tiny area to fly a drone.

If I drive 2 hours I'm deep in the mountains (in which case I come against a different problem, flying them in national parks is also illegal), or 100 miles from anything but small villages and isolated farms. Now consider something like that in the uk. Perhaps you'll be able to fly a drone somewhere in northern Scotland if you're lucky?

Like any law it needs to be sensible. Should you really not be allowed to fully a drone at 30m 3km from an airstrip possibly used once a year (if that), or even a major airport? I'm all for no fly zones and I think a legal requirement for the use during commercial work makes sense (if what is considered commercial is very itemized, rather than some random broad brush approach).

Governments are really struggling with regulations at the moment because they are such a new entity. Some, like Canada, have essentially banned them until perhaps in the future they can come up with a considered approach, some, like the UK don't seem to have done too badly with the regulations, but are still having teething problems caused by the occasional idiot.

Hard coded no fly zones make sense, but they need to be considered and sensible - just a blanket ban x km from airports is not the way to do it. Perhaps some kind of staggered height ban around airports - say 10m within 1km of the airport moving to max height a couple of km from them, with runway zones at either end of the runway with even stricter heights? Make the "hard coded" NFZ sensible and far more people are likely to stick to actually using them, reducing the number of incidents where many may not even consider they are causing issues.

Same with registration. If it happens it needs to be sensible, it needs to be easy and it needs to be cheap - it could easily just be having the equivalent of a VIN on each control module which is registered by the seller (for free) on a central portal when someone buys it.

Again, keep it simple, keep it fair, and then if people act like ***** then they have nothing to blame their idiocy on.
 
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Had a drone hovering over our garden today at about 15m.

Solution - every drone must flash out a unique reg code using its nav lights as well as on wifi. That code is registered to the user.

If I film the drone on my mobile the code can be obtained by the police and the owner fined. Equally if the drone is in restricted airspace the wifi code can be used to trace the owner at greater range.

Any drone not conforming to these rules is illegal and can be confiscated.


firstly have you ever filmmed a flashing light with your phone before?

hint you arent getting an accurate timing from it.


secondly do we really need more unnecessary noise on the wifi bands?


thirdly, how the heck are the police going to track down a drone from a video in your garden, given any idiopt would tape over thier lights and your video is useless.
 
all of this owner registration hard coded no fly xzones etc all seems to miss the poiunt you can buy the parts and build one with non of that stuff included
 
Lol, I was just throwing out random numbers really.

What really important is a safe radius within airports, which is common sense. Canada has the same rules I believe.


so will you be stopping the use of your drone for work until you obtain a license?

edit: nvm read on thought you had been usibng one not planning to use one
 
all of this owner registration hard coded no fly xzones etc all seems to miss the poiunt you can buy the parts and build one with non of that stuff included

the same as you've been able to build and fly an rc plane/helicopter for years, but the technical challenge of doing so kept the morons from being able to create/fly them well enough to do any harm.

anyone who could build one, as with building your own drone, is going to be an enthusiast, and these people aren't a danger because they're smart enough to realise how stupid flying it near an airport is.
 
I do agree with the fact that it should be mandatory to register your drone. and that it should have an identifier so that it can be traced back to the owner if it's in an area that it shouldn't have been. Us responsible fliers wouldn't have anything to worry about, but at the moment, it's the 0.0001% of bad pilots spoiling it for the 99.9999% of responsible pilots.
Unless you try to implement it on a DVLA style scale it's a complete waste of time.

Mandatory is good in theory but can't be enforced so all the problem drones would remain unregistered.

All it would achieve is job creation for some plebs to sit processing pointless registration forms whilst the minority carry on being prats with unregistered drones.

You have to ask yourself, who would stop you flying an unregistered drone and how?
 
the same as you've been able to build and fly an rc plane/helicopter for years, but the technical challenge of doing so kept the morons from being able to create/fly them well enough to do any harm.

anyone who could build one, as with building your own drone, is going to be an enthusiast, and these people aren't a danger because they're smart enough to realise how stupid flying it near an airport is.

you can buy kits that dont take very long top put together.

and these people aren't a danger because they're smart enough to realise how stupid flying it near an airport is.

i think you'll find "enthusiasts" of any sector are ususaly the biggest hassle as they think theyre good enough to avoid the dangers
 
i think you'll find "enthusiasts" of any sector are ususaly the biggest hassle as they think theyre good enough to avoid the dangers

then how come flights being rerouted for people flying near airports has become an issue only since mass market drones became popular?

rc planes/helicopters have been around for donkeys without issues, hence my point.
 
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