More Post 9/11 paranoia?

[Rageaholic]

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's... an RC Drone

So basically these two guys were flying one of those RC drones and they got a little too close to an NYPD helicopter. Helicopter had to swerve to avoid a collision. Two guys could be facing felony charges.

Now if these guys intentionally flew the drone in the path of the helicopter, than yeah, they deserve to be charged. There was a case earlier this month where some guy pointed one of those laser pointers at a plane and it blinded the pilot temporarly. (can't remember what he's being charged with though).

But there are two sides to every story and I can't help but think that there is some huge overreaction here. We're just too paranoid after 9/11. People go berserk if they see someone taking pictures at a shooping mall because omg they could be a terrorist111! So I wonder if the helicopter cops just overreacted at the first sight of the drone.

[TheHuckster]

This has absolutely nothing to do with 9/11 but everything to do with basic aircraft safety and not being a fucking dipshit. Forcing a helicopter to swerve at merely 2,000 feet above one of the most congested airspaces in the world is incredibly dangerous. I don't care if they didn't know any better, it could have resulted in many deaths. FAA regulations prohibit unauthorized aircraft above 400 feet, and doing so can carry hefty fines, especially if it results in an incursion as this one did.

As for blinding pilots with laser pointers, that is just as criminally stupid, and doing anything to disrupt or disorient someone responsible for keeping a 50 ton piece of metal from crashing into people's houses is an action which puts many lives in danger.

Unless these people are being charged as terrorists and being sent to Gitmo, this has jack shit to do with 9/11, and I guarantee you, they'd be charged before 9/11 with the same crime.

[Rageaholic]

As for blinding pilots with laser pointers, that is just as criminally stupid, and doing anything to disrupt or disorient someone responsible for keeping a 50 ton piece of metal from crashing into people's houses is an action which puts many lives in danger.

Oh, I'm not at all arguing that the person who shot the laser pointer at the airplane should be let off. He or she's an asshole who should be kicked where it hurts for doing something so dangerous.

Now for the drone pilots, I hear two sides. One says they were flying at 300 feet which would be fine, but others saying much higher. That said, assuming they were just flying the thing high and didn't actually intend to cause disruption, I think felony charges (that can ruin their life) is an overkill.

Though the thing that scares me the most about this is how easy it can be to disrupt aircraft. If ordinary joes who are just having fun can cause a safety hazard, than what can terrorists do?

/Glad this wasn't more serious.

[TheHuckster]

Now for the drone pilots, I hear two sides. One says they were flying at 300 feet which would be fine, but others saying much higher. That said, assuming they were just flying the thing high and didn't actually intend to cause disruption, I think felony charges (that can ruin their life) is an overkill.

If they were truly flying at under 400 feet, then I would agree that they were within the parameters of FAA regulations (provided they weren't right next to an airfield or helicopter pad) and shouldn't be charged with a felony. If they were flying above 400 feet, and up to 2,000 feet, in a crowded airspace where you have aircraft making very critical approaches at three major airports, along with many general aviation aircraft and helicopters on VFR who already have to watch out for other aircraft that have the benefit of having transponders and are easily seen on radar and large enough to see with clear visibility, it should be quite obvious doing so is a really stupid idea.

Though the thing that scares me the most about this is how easy it can be to disrupt aircraft. If ordinary joes who are just having fun can cause a safety hazard, than what can terrorists do?

Indeed. Anyone can easily wreak havoc with simple tools. It doesn't need to be anything as sophisticated as 9/11. The reason they chose such a sophisticated attack on 9/11 is because, well, here we are talking about it right now. If a terrorist had simply used a laser pointer to disrupt an aircraft on approach to an airport, causing it to crash, yes it would have been newsworthy and people would be talking about it, but not to the extent we talk about 9/11.

Terrorism is just as much about leaving an impression on who they want to call attention to as it is about killing innocent people.

[BlaqueKatt]

One says they were flying at 300 feet which would be fine, but others saying much higher. That said, assuming they were just flying the thing high and didn't actually intend to cause disruption, I think felony charges (that can ruin their life) is an overkill.

If they were truly flying at under 400 feet, then I would agree that they were within the parameters of FAA regulations

nope, it's a 3 part rule, breaking any one of the three(they violated 2 of 3), they're not within parameters.
FAA

FAA guidance says that model aircraft flights should be kept below 400 feet above ground level, should be flown a sufficient distance from populated areas and full scale aircraft

even below 300 ft they're *still* in violation.

[Gravekeeper]

Looks like it was bullshit by the NYPD. According to the air traffic control recordings, there was no near miss, the chopper never had to swerve and the chopper was intentionally following the drone. Much to the bafflement of the two guys that own it. They never brought the drone anywhere near the chopper, it was the other way around. So basically the NYPD chopper saw someone's RC toy and followed it all the way back to their house in a helicopter so they could arrest everyone involved.

Also the chopper pilots claimed the drone climbed 2000 feet in 2 seconds. Right. >.>

[s_stabeler]

while it may well be a legit tactic to follow an RC drone that is flying illegally, you should at least be honest about what you were doing. In other words, don't make up a near miss by a drone ( implying carelessness by the drone pilot) when any near miss was probably due to the helicopter.

and also, it might well be a good idea to make it a misdemenor offence for the less serious breaches. (basically, keep the felony offences for flying an R/C drone around airports/helipads- I don't think they can even go high enough to be an issue for aircraft elsewhere)

As for the FAA regs, how do they define populated area? do you have to be a certain distance away from the nearest house to legally fly an R/C drone? (for example, if you went to an abandoned airport, would it be legal to fly an R/C drone there?)

by the way, let alone climb 2000 feet in 2 seconds, can they even get that far away from the R/C unit?

[Gravekeeper]

by the way, let alone climb 2000 feet in 2 seconds, can they even get that far away from the R/C unit?

The drone in question has a stock range of about 1000 feet though it can get out further provided you maintain a clear line of transmission and there's nothing around that could cause radio interference. If it loses signal it basically goes on autopilot and returns. It, however, can only ascend at a top speed of 19 feet per second. >.>

Apparently the police seriously thought they were chasing a military drone ( Why the fuck they thought chasing a military drone was a good idea is beyond me ).

This is what they were chasing. Because that totally screams military hardware and not Toys R Us.


Here's the transcript:

NYPD—What kind of contact do you have … at this time.
Tower—What do you mean, what kind of contact?
NYPD—I don’t know. We just had an aircraft do vertical climbs pretty fast.
Tower—I don’t see anything on the radar. About how high would you say it went?
NYPD—I'd say 0 to about 2,000 [feet] in less than two seconds. And he's got green and red now. He's going up Spuyten Duyval [bridge], northbound at this time.
Tower—Really? I don’t see anything on the radar. Im not seeing anything like that.
NYPD—He has to be military. He's moving. He's right over top of us right now, LaGuardia. He did a 180 really quick. Going down the east river at this time. I just want to make sure its not a drone.
Tower—I’ll look out the window.
NYPD—LaGuardia we are 800 feet and he is level with us at this time.
Tower—He's level.
NYPD—Going Spuyten Duyval to the [George Washington Bridge]. He's got to be a drone.
Tower—Roger that.
NYPD—He's got red and green lights. Hes trucking, hes moving fast. LaGuardia, definitely a drone. Hes going up the streets now between buildings.
Tower—Ok, all right. Man, theres really gotta be a better way to maybe disable these guys.
NYPD—We are going to stay here and figure out where he puts it.
Tower—Take your time, you’re the only ones in the air.
NYPD—Will do. Yeah, we got drone activity at the GW Bridge. We are trying to walk an RMP [remote mobile patrol] into it. We got the guys operating it on the ground. Hopefully we can get these guys collared up.
Tower—In the vicinity of the GW? They were at the GW. Now I got three, four, coming up to Fairview and 193, vicinity of.
Tower—All right, you want me to do anything from here.
NYPD—Nope, just letting you know.
NYPD—Ok we got these guys are saying these are just toys but these drones were flying in vicinity of [George Washington Bridge]. They buzz around us as well.
Tower—All right what altitude were you guys at.
NYPD—These things were well over 2,000 feet. They were above us at 1,000.
Tower—You still have a visual.
NYPD—No, we've got custody, we've locked the [radio mobile patrol police cars] into them. You know, we have the guys who were operating them. We really don’t know exactly what we have, maybe a reckless. Not sure what exactly we got.
Tower—All right 10-4.
NYPD—Just so you know there was a class given to lt perez, I don’t know if you want to disturb him or not, but he had all the info on that.
Tower—All right 10-4 thank you.
NYPD—Tiny little, we got them on the ground now. Tiny little drones with four blades on it. But, yeah, It was all the way over the GW. Now we are all the way over at Spuyten Duyval flying two miles away to 2,000 feet.
NYPD—They are with them right now, but we don’t even know what we have.
NYPD—Definitely, we just don’t know what kind of crime we have right now.
NYPD—Seems to me, if they were at 1,000 feet, they'd have to be operating that thing recklessly, regardless of whether or not it was a toy.

The most relevant part I would say is:
"Definitely, we just don’t know what kind of crime we have right now."

We don't know if this is actually illegal so we'll chase it down, arrest everyone involved and just make shit up so its a felony?

According to the pilots, witnesses and what the pilot's say is on the drone's footage, the drone was flying about as high as the 5th-6th floor of a building and was no where near the bridge nor buzzing a chopper.