http://motherboard.vice.com/read/faa-can-make-all-drone-flights-illegal-appeals-court-rules (http://motherboard.vice.com/read/faa-can-make-all-drone-flights-illegal-appeals-court-rules)
And the lawyers once again start to rub their hands in expectation of more fat fees ......
Its almost laughable, ill though out and quite worrying really.
Was going to mention this yesterday.. but not sure if we were doing the "tales of woe" sort of threads. The judge and the FAA have gone into stupid-overdrive in this case. Basically saying that any flying thing is and aircraft, so paper planes, frisbees, balls could all come under this. I wish some basic common sense could be applied in these cases
That's what you get with a Federal Government though. I dont think it's a tale of woe though just common interest. The yanks always over react to this kind of issue: we probably would if we had 90 firearms per 100 residents (wikepedia). We already have the legislation in place Nationally so no problem.
Maybe Flitetest will consider their non-domestic market at last and sort out cheaper shipping/supply to the UK after all :)
Do helicopters really crash more often than planes? Yes. Helicopters crash at a slightly higher rate than aircraft overall, according to data collected by the National Transportation Safety Board. General aircraft—airplanes, helicopters, balloons, blimps, and everything else—average 7.28 crashes for every 100,000 hours of flight time. The crash rate for helicopters alone is 9.84 per 100,000 hours. That means helicopters crash about 35 percent more often per hour in the air than your average aircraft. (Of course, not all planes are created equal: Single-engine piston planes are 10 times more likely to crash than jets.) Helicopter crashes, however, are less likely to kill you: The fatality rate in helicopter crashes is 1.3 deaths per 100,000 flight hours versus 1.4 deaths for aircraft in general. Source: www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2009/10/hellish_copters.html (http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/explainer/2009/10/hellish_copters.html)
OK, so how many fatalities or even serious injuries involving model aircraft were there in the last year?
PS - Coyote - please feel free to stop this thread as it may be off-limits!
In the uk? Last one I was involved with was in St Albans. The fallout from that caused the fail safe regulation by the CAA
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/503181.stm
Wouldn't want to go through that again
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A desperately sad case. I understand that there was also a very serious case a couple of years or so ago which resulted in the BMFA increasing their insurance cover to £15m if I recall correctly. Insurance premiums are obviously related to claims experience and BMFA insurance is pretty cheap.
I too was going to mention the ongoing FAA v Pirker case and its most recent development, but thought better of it because of the previous coverage it has had. However as this thread is not directly about that case it might be worth pointing out that the CAA regulates all aircraft in the UK, whether they are A380 sized or balsa chuck gliders. In that respect the FAA want to do the same. I have no problem with this in principle. Where the FAA have been shown to be desperately inadequate is that they have failed to properly address the category of aircraft into which recreational models belong. It's not as if they haven't had long enough or there has been insufficient interest in the hobby. The CAA and other national aviation regulators are light years ahead of the FAA. They recognise that whilst model aircraft are indeed aircraft and fly using the same physics and mechanics as full sized, they are not in the same category and hence have their own regulations derived from basic principles of not jeopardising life and limb. If you only needed to know two things about model aircraft they are explained very clearly by the CAA.
For the purposes of this document (CAP 658) a 'model aircraft' is defined as any 'Small Unmanned Aircraft (SUA)' (0-20 kg) used for sporting and recreational purposes and a 'large model aircraft' is defined as any 'Unmanned Aircraft' (over 20 kg) used for sporting and recreational purposes. The Air Navigation Order (ANO) 2009 contains the legal definition of 'Small Unmanned Aircraft' and this definition is listed in this chapter.
ANO Article 138 – Endangering safety of any person or property
'A person must not recklessly or negligently cause or permit an aircraft to endanger any person or property.'
How easy is that FAA? It's about time they got their act together.
Well put.
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Agreed. It's amazing that in such a massive country with so much open space and huge scientific resources they act as though they want to deny their people of the benefits of this technology.
Of course they do - most of the people using the tech have more understanding of it than any government official and that just won't do...
IBCrazy pretty much sums up how stupid its getting over the pond now
Indoor sUAS flight is now a $10,000 fine! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13C_gs4a3Tw#ws)
We have things pretty easy here with the CAA compared to all this farce :)
Its gone beyond laughable ,
Quote from: Heliotrope on November 21, 2014, 10:36:31 AM
Agreed. It's amazing that in such a massive country with so much open space and huge scientific resources they act as though they want to deny their people of the benefits of this technology.
Let's be honest what's the benefit of the tech to the community and the people of the USA?! :s
Don't kid yourself- the ability of someone to take a video of their child/property/a nice view from their quadcopter has absolutely no benefit to the community or the people of the USA.
All the real benefits (search and rescue, property and landscape analysis/viewing, cheaper arial photography for low budget productions) along with lots of other obscure benefits can still be performed by the fully insured and regulated professionals.
Not having a go at you- but I think FPVers can lose perspective and get very egotistical about their hobby. People argue for it and compare it to the fear people had for the car. Someone with £500 who wants to mess about with a drone is hardly comparable to the development of the car. It has potential in commercial uses of course. But that's not the same.
When courier by drone actually becomes a viable option they will have to relent anyway. Until then- it's very hard to police and monitor so people will just fly in obscure places away from people- which is largely what they should be doing anyway :)
It's the USA anyway who cares?!