Drone apparently crashes into plane headed to London's Heathrow

[Carson Dyle]

I just knew one of these things was going to take out a commercial jet and kill hundreds of people. Now look what's happened. Hundreds on the plane and many more on the ground killed, just because someone was playing with their drone near an airport.

Just like all those commercial jets that have been dropped from the sky by people with lasers. How many tens of thousands more people must die?

God help us all. It's not safe any more.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/17/europe/london-heathrow-drone-strikes-plane/index.html

 

[JulesMaximus]

Sweet! I guess we can remove all those silly restrictions on flying drones near airports now because it is perfectly safe. :thumbsup:

 

[CZroe]

Sweet! I guess we can remove all those silly restrictions on flying drones near airports now because it is perfectly safe. :thumbsup:

Thy really aren't any different than the RC planes and helicopters hobbyists have been flying for decades but suddenly there's a huge concern and overly-specific laws being passed. It's really weird

Edit:
A pilot's perspective.

 

[Kaido]

Thy really aren't any different than the RC planes and helicopters hobbyists have been flying for decades but suddenly there's a huge concern and overly-specific laws being passed. It's really weird.

It's hugely different. In the past, you'd typically join a model airplane club, practice a bunch, and fly at a field that had insurance. People have been killed by model airplanes (some fly over 100 MPH), not to mention the property damage concerns. Then they started selling R/C stuff at toy stores, but those were mostly low-powered electric stuff made out of foam & plastic, so there wasn't much harm flying them at a local park.

Now, anyone with $99 can go buy an amazing drone that flies hundreds of feet up with no skill required. Heck, even my last $39 hexadrone off Amazon can do that. Plus you can get a camera drone for pretty cheap these days too, so everyone & their dog has one, a lot of them with no concept of rules or consequences about flying near places like airports - maybe they just want some cool shots of airplanes for Facebook & Youtube. You can't guarantee that there won't be interference, wind, or some other problem that knocks your drone off course. The pilot of the drone has 100% of the responsibility for where it goes, who it hits, and what it crashes into, so they are liable for everything, no matter what happens. So that's a big reason that people are concerned & there are laws being passed...it's not like you have to go get a driver's license to fly a drone around, and even the heavier ones only require a simple online registration.

 

[Kaido]

A pilot's perspective.

It's a tricky things for a lot of reasons:

1. People are stupid. I don't mean that in a mean way, I mean that there is a segment of the population that doesn't think before they act, and do moronic stuff like fly drones near airports. As has happened dozens of times in the past. Not to mention crashing into people, into cars, into pets, into homes, into property, as well as preventing rescue crews from doing their jobs. More than once, a drone has prevented a water drop from aircraft putting out fires, which costs $10k+ to divert:

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-wildfires-southern-california-20150625-story.html

2. The laws are new & still pretty unregulated. There's nothing stopping you from doing this, for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmD3rXUR1Tw

3. Even if they passed more laws & put more regulations in, people would just sneak stuff in from China. You can buy a drone the size of a quarter for $17 these days. For $25, you can even get one with a camera built-in:

http://www.amazon.com/Cheerson-CX-10C-Quadcopter-Camera--Orange/dp/B01B698SEI/

So you have to balance people being dumb vs. millions of these things floating around already, it's just a difficult issue to deal with because a small handful of people can ruin it for the rest of us. Here's a small log of recent drone issues:

http://rochester.nydatabases.com/map/domestic-drone-accidents

 

[DrPizza]

Thy really aren't any different than the RC planes and helicopters hobbyists have been flying for decades but suddenly there's a huge concern and overly-specific laws being passed. It's really weird

Edit:
A pilot's perspective.

From the pilot's perspective, it seems that consumer drones are pretty harmless against jets - it's all about mass. They fire turkeys at jets at high speed to test them out - a turkey is going to bounce off the cockpit windshield of a jet. So, treat it as a civil issue for now (per the pilot.)

 

[CZroe]

It's hugely different. In the past, you'd typically join a model airplane club, practice a bunch, and fly at a field that had insurance. People have been killed by model airplanes (some fly over 100 MPH), not to mention the property damage concerns. Then they started selling R/C stuff at toy stores, but those were mostly low-powered electric stuff made out of foam & plastic, so there wasn't much harm flying them at a local park.

Now, anyone with $99 can go buy an amazing drone that flies hundreds of feet up with no skill required. Heck, even my last $39 hexadrone off Amazon can do that. Plus you can get a camera drone for pretty cheap these days too, so everyone & their dog has one, a lot of them with no concept of rules or consequences about flying near places like airports - maybe they just want some cool shots of airplanes for Facebook & Youtube. You can't guarantee that there won't be interference, wind, or some other problem that knocks your drone off course. The pilot of the drone has 100% of the responsibility for where it goes, who it hits, and what it crashes into, so they are liable for everything, no matter what happens. So that's a big reason that people are concerned & there are laws being passed...it's not like you have to go get a driver's license to fly a drone around, and even the heavier ones only require a simple online registration.

My point is that the laws are overly specific. An RC copter has far more maneuverability and control than my $50 Cox Airwolf free-flight helicopter that I bought in the late '80s. That thing would go hundreds of feet up until it was just a spec in the sky and all we could do was wait for it to run out of gas.

Your argument that classic flying RC machines are much more dangerous, heavier, and require more skill and practice is exactly my point: they need to be regulated just as much if not more. If legislation is suddenly needed because drones have brought flying RC devices to the masses, the traditional users are also part of the masses. It's like all this "Internet sales tax" BS: it never should have been discussed as an "Internet" sales tax, only as a universally applied mail-order sales tax.

Now, I don't think it should be legal for my to fly my Cox Airwolf or UFO near an airport and I'm pretty sure I'd be in trouble if I did so and it damaged or crashed an aircraft even without a specific law (existing civil liabilities). If we agree that they should all be treated the same, we now have to decide if existing civil liabilities are enough or if new laws are needed.

From the pilot's perspective, it seems that consumer drones are pretty harmless against jets - it's all about mass. They fire turkeys at jets at high speed to test them out - a turkey is going to bounce off the cockpit windshield of a jet. So, treat it as a civil issue for now (per the pilot.)

Also, this pilot flys smaller planes... the very ones he says are vulnerable to it.

Edit:
http://youtu.be/X7h3YP_Qq6w

I got mine from Wal-Mart when I was 7 years old. Cox was still selling free-flight gas-powered helicopters for $15 new last I checked, so that $50 was apparently because it was Airwolf-branded.

$15 free-flight copter from 8 years ago:
http://youtu.be/ecEUTIes3Kc

Look at how out-of-control it is at the start! No one took classes or went to insured airfields to fly those. Now, why are we still so focused on drones specifically?.

Also, at the "mostly electric" part. For decades and decades these things were primarily IC engines with electronic controls. The electric stuff is only 15-20 years older than drones and such. Even those tethered planes that whip around in a circle were IC and not electric.

 

[skyking]

Virtually no one mounted cameras on RC planes and copters. I posit that the advent of the digital camera tech has brought this thing to a head. Everybody is "look at me" and has their head up their ass about anything else.
When you throw down $2000 on a fancy camera platform, you want to get some cool videos for your money. This leads to stupid stuff.

 

[CZroe]

Virtually no one mounted cameras on RC planes and copters. I posit that the advent of the digital camera tech has brought this thing to a head. Everybody is "look at me" and has their head up their ass about anything else.
When you throw down $2000 on a fancy camera platform, you want to get some cool videos for your money. This leads to stupid stuff.

Estes had a model rocket with a camera on it.

 

[Jeffg010]

I just knew one of these things was going to take out a commercial jet and kill hundreds of people. Now look what's happened. Hundreds on the plane and many more on the ground killed, just because someone was playing with their drone near an airport.

Just like all those commercial jets that have been dropped from the sky by people with lasers. How many tens of thousands more people must die?

God help us all. It's not safe any more.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/04/17/europe/london-heathrow-drone-strikes-plane/index.html

No one was killed read it again. It crashed into a jet but they landed safe. I do agree that people are stupid and need better judgment. How you going to getting these fools? Once one crashes in to a jet the person will be long gone they figure out what happened.

 

[Jeffg010]

Estes had a model rocket with a camera on it.

I remember in 9th grade we had to order a rocket for science class I and wanted that rocket but I was poor.

 

[soulcougher73]

All depends on where it hits the plane really.

 

[CZroe]

No one was killed read it again. It crashed into a jet but they landed safe. I do agree that people are stupid and need better judgment. How you going to getting these fools? Once one crashes in to a jet the person will be long gone they figure out what happened.

Check your sarcasm meter. Something's not right.

 

[Ns1]

We're not actually downplaying the dangers of a jet engine sucking in a drone are we?

 

[SSSnail]

From the pilot's perspective, it seems that consumer drones are pretty harmless against jets - it's all about mass. They fire turkeys at jets at high speed to test them out - a turkey is going to bounce off the cockpit windshield of a jet. So, treat it as a civil issue for now (per the pilot.)

Would you like to be on a jet where a drone (or an object of "insignificant mass", as you call it) is ingested into the intake of your engine? I mean, since it's harmless, I'd like for you to test out your theory.

 

[Ns1]

Would you like to be on a jet where a drone (or an object of "insignificant mass", as you call it) is ingested into the intake of your engine? I mean, since it's harmless, I'd like for you to test out your theory.

Shit is so obvious it hurts.

 

[JulesMaximus]

From the pilot's perspective, it seems that consumer drones are pretty harmless against jets - it's all about mass. They fire turkeys at jets at high speed to test them out - a turkey is going to bounce off the cockpit windshield of a jet. So, treat it as a civil issue for now (per the pilot.)

Yet a flock of Canadian Geese brought down a US Airways flight in 2009 after being ingested by the engines shortly after takeoff, causing both engines to fail.

 

[Ns1]

Yet a flock of Canadian Geese brought down a US Airways flight in 2009 after being ingested by the engines shortly after takeoff, causing both engines to fail.

But those geese would have bounced right off the cockpit windows!

 

[CZroe]

But those geese would have bounced right off the cockpit windows!

Pass a law banning geese then. At least a drone operator is already civilly liable without new legislation.

 

[Ns1]

Pass a law banning geese then. At least a drone operator is already civilly liable without new legislation.

Yeah I'm sure that'll help when it takes down a plane filled with 300 people.

My relatives will be relieved by the $5 check they will be able to collect from him.

 

[SSSnail]

Pass a law banning geese then. At least a drone operator is already civilly liable without new legislation.

We control what we can. Because, intelligence and all that.

 

[CZroe]

Yeah I'm sure that'll help when it takes down a plane filled with 300 people

The law is not supposed to protect us from ourselves. It's supposed to punish people who violate the freedoms of others. We make an example out of the person responsible using existing laws to discourage others from doing it. It'll help the next plane full of 300 people.

You're one step away from penalizing thought crimes.

 

[CZroe]

We control what we can. Because, intelligence and all that.

Yep. We control future risky behavior by demonstrating consequences for past behavior. Like I said: I wouldn't fly my Cox .049 Airwolf helicopter near an airport either.

 

[mafia]

From the pilot's perspective, it seems that consumer drones are pretty harmless against jets - it's all about mass. They fire turkeys at jets at high speed to test them out - a turkey is going to bounce off the cockpit windshield of a jet. So, treat it as a civil issue for now (per the pilot.)

That pilot is an idiot. They fire turkeys at jet engines to see if the engine is able to sustain itself and ensure that no metal pieces from the engine fly out during and after the explosion which could cause damage to the airplane. The engine will not produce thrust after the incident.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO1V8E6Qb9M

Real life incident:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KhZwsYtNDE

Would you like to be on a jet where a drone (or an object of "insignificant mass", as you call it) is ingested into the intake of your engine? I mean, since it's harmless, I'd like for you to test out your theory.

Already been tested. US Airways which crashed into Hudson with both engines being ingested with birds.

 

[Ns1]

The law is not supposed to protect us from ourselves. It's supposed to punish people who violate the freedoms of others. We make an example out of the person responsible using existing laws to discourage others from doing it. It'll help the next plane full of 300 people.

You're one step away from penalizing thought crimes.

Or we can just you know fix this drone problem before it takes down an a380.

I don't know what "fix" entails but civil liability after the fact ain't it