Drone believed to have hit British Airways flight 'may have been a plastic bag'
telegraph.co.uk
telegraph.co.uk
> Transport minister Robert Goodwill admitted authorities had not yet confirmed whether what struck the Airbus A320
> Mr Goodwill also dismissed calls for tighter rules on drone use to protect against terror threats insisting current rules governing drone use were strong enough. He said it would be much easier for terrorists to attack airports on the ground with rucksacks or car bombs than orchestrate the attack from a drone aircraft.
> He warned that any moves to enforce geo-fencing rules would be vulnerable to being hacked by "somebody who could get round that software".
> "And indeed the early reports of a dent in the front of the plane were not confirmed - there was no actual damage to the plane"
> "the pilot has a lot of other things to concentrate [while landing] on so we're not quite sure what they saw so I think we should maybe not overreact too much."
This is a sane, rational response.. I am just not used to hearing it come from government officials. This should be a model for the type of responses that government officials have to these types of situations.
The culture of fear is a widespread human fallibility, not an evil corporate invention.
The fact rationality, and how to perceive the world without tripping over our human biases/fallacies, is not taught with any priority in society is the real issue. That is the root cause of the anti-intellectualism that's so widespread IMO. No-one in the chain approached the topic with any level of skepticism. Just retweeting and reblogging a story without any solid evidence, giving it more and more credibility.
Indeed very impressive that an elected official understands this.
Someone with a little reverse engineering talent can patch something like that without much work for near-free (think bypassing those FCC regulations turning up TX power in your router firmware). Someone with a little regular engineering talent can spoof or jam GPS for relatively cheap.
(Just like people usually attribute speeches to a mythical, composite `Obama' person, even though the roles of performer and speechwriter are done by different people.)
As for refrigerators, I am just as worried about people trying to fly drones around my house as I am about people flying drones around planes, yes. I have it on good authority that anyone with the funds can purchase access to 3D drone-generated map of my city, my house included. A gentleman here in town who replaces windows doesn't bother to measure them anymore; he just uses the drone photos.
Geofencing only works if people stick to the rules. Criminals normaly don't.
That said, geofencing is not to protect planes from terrorists, it's to protect them from stupid.
a few years ago the response was positive and interested, almost universally - even though I was at that point flying in town due to lack of regulation.
Media has trained them to be scared of drones, like everything else.
That said, I still think it's a good idea to implement. It will make it easier for casuals like me to quickly be warned when I'm venturing into forbidden areas. Sure, I could ignore it or hack around it, but at least it's an easy to implement safeguard that will keep most people away.
Instead it will enable mission creep as more places get banned because embarrassing things, like protesters getting beaten, happen there.
A bad guy used encryption? ...
It depends where you're talking about. Close to airports is the major issue. 2nm from the runway planes will be at 600ft, which is well within the range of drones.
>Instead it will enable mission creep as more places get banned because embarrassing things, like protesters getting beaten, happen there.
We're talking about voluntary geofencing here, by the companies themselves.
Much as I like the idea of keeping drones away from planes, just look at how governments have abused other "voluntary" restriction systems. For example, ISPs install filters for ostensibly noble causes, then governments commandeer them for more questionable uses.
Which governments of civilized, democratic countries have commandeered ISP's filters for questionable uses? If you're talking about the UK porn filter, it is the other way around: government has instituted a law saying they have to do it.
Even if it were a law, I don't see the issue that you are arguing. You're essentially saying "I don't want a law that says drones are banned by default from controlled airspace, because the government might change it's mind and also ban drones from places that embarrass the government", which is just another slippery slope argument.
Are you saying you don't want any laws at all, and people should just be able to do anything they want?
Yeah, that's the point. When the technology has been demonstrated to work (even if badly) in some areas it's suddenly mandated in other areas.
Now we have a technology that was so-so at blocking unwanted porn being used for everything from catching pedophiles to checking for intel leaks. A false-positive in porn blocking was annoying, in pedo-detection it can ruin lives. Worse, when functioning properly it can prop up repressive regimes.
> Are you saying you don't want any laws at all, and people should just be able to do anything they want?
Is that the only choice? Egregious laws that harm innocents and don't actually solve the issue versus no law at all? Well in that case, it's clear. No law is better than being stuck with bad law that doesn't actually help...
But thankfully those aren't the only options. We can push back against bad laws (useless, abusive, etc) and accept the good ones.
> "I don't want a law that says drones are banned by default from controlled airspace, because the government might change it's mind and also ban drones from places that embarrass the government", which is just another slippery slope argument.
No, we don't want useless technological measures mandated that claim to block drones from airports, but fail to actually help in a real security context. Because those useless security rules have only one real purpose - banning civilians from inconvenient things.
Laws, like lines of code, have a distinct cost and we should only add the ones that will actually help.
It's not useless. Do you fly planes? If you look at the youtube video I posted elsewhere in this thread you'll see that the guy wanted to fly near the airport on the beach, but the geo fence wouldn't let him. The beach is <0.5nm from the end of the runways, so planes will be at <300ft crossing the beach. I fly there myself, and I don't want to hit a drone and risk losing the engine or having it crash through the windshield into my face.
Unfortunately we need laws like this because people aren't responsible, as that youtube video proves.
So as a convenience feature that told me I the conditions for where I'm flying, it'd be great. And then it'd only need to be 4-nines, and wouldn't have to have fail-proof lockouts, etc.
But as a major portion of the defense of our air fleet - no. That's ridiculous. If we're that worried we need to figure out something to actually make us safer, not add another perpetual layer of theater.
I'm not sure that seeing an actual implementation is required for politician to have harebrained ideas. Besides, as others have pointed out, geofencing has already been implemented by DJI, so we're past that phase anyway.
Strange, I'm having a hard time thinking of a single US government program that hasn't expanded far beyond the original justification. Bureaucracies expand, water is wet. A classic example of a USG switcheroo would be the social security number being used for identification purposes beyond social security administration. A more contemporary example would be the NSA providing intel to the DEA for domestic law enforcement, which I'm sure wasn't part of the founding mission statement.
> Which governments of civilized, democratic countries...
So only a true Scotsman?
> Are you saying you don't want any laws...
Are you saying that if somebody caused an accident with a drone, then prosecutors would just throw up their hands? We already have enough laws on the books to charge anybody for anything. If causing a horrible accident isn't enough of disincentive for a drone operator then I doubt that they'd pay any attention to the FAA.
That's not "voluntary" - the manufacturers are not the owners/operators of the drones.
We don't need any more encouragement of device lockdown, treacherous computing, and the general erosion of ownership.
Actually, we do, at least in this case. The majority of users don't know/care about flying close to airports. (See my other comments in the thread).
From what I can tell, however, all the larger drones tend to have geofencing already, so perhaps the current de facto situation is adequate.
In any industry that adopts treacherous computing, it spreads like cancer. Phones, cars, entertainment, payment cards. Assumptions of the user being hostile get baked into the design and business models, and must be fortified ever-harder over time. In a computing-based world, perverted cultures that mandate closed devices are simply incompatible with individual autonomy and self-reliance. "Selling" a device while retaining control over it is basically fraud.
Pragmatically, I'd be in favor of the "default config" coming with built-in geofencing to avoid thoughtless idiotic situations. But then the ability to change and fully remove that code must also be provided, ideally through well-documented reflashing process. Anything less creates the unavoidable centralizing path down the slippery slope, and from the users' perspective it hardly matters whether it's the manufacturer or government driving the process.
not legally
A gps costs under $1 today:
http://www.alibaba.com/showroom/gps-chip-price.html
>Also, the forbidden areas may vary
It's mostly airports that we need to worry about, and they don't tend to change much. Sure, TMA boundaries might vary occasionally, but that's not really much of a worry, because most drones won't be up at 1000+ ft.
At DEFCON someone demonstrated dropping drones from the sky by spoofing GPS coordinates to inside an airport. Funny, but it guarantees I won't be buying one of them because of the potential for harm to my camera, etc.
They're also prohibitively heavy on smaller models. A 10% increase in mass (for a 300g quadrotor) can shave an entire minute off of your run time.
The cheaper ones are frequently controlled by a smartphone app, which can do the geofencing for it.
More useful would be a lower ceiling in no-fly zones, tbh; no-fly is appropriate for real aircraft, but for toys there is value in considering "no-fly" and "low-fly".
Yes, it's definitely a good idea that will stop casual drone users from being somewhere they shouldn't be flying. Here is a good example (see the description):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EH7y8-gkkN0
The vast majority of drone users won't bother looking up the aviation charts to see if they are inside a control zone or other controlled airspace, and won't have any idea how far away they are from an airport.
"We need to do this or that because terrorism and won't somebody please think of the children."
"Well, now that it's in place, it would be a shame not to use it against illegal <insert something harmless or subversive here>."
And usually they manage to design laws so that diverting their use doesn't require passing through parliament again.
However, right now I am not flying higher than 10 meters from the ground.
All that without specifying whether or not you have knowledge in the space. You probably should have specified X and Y are already in the space rather than assuming that someone already has taken up space there.
Haha joke's on you buddy, I grew up around aviation and know that log books and maps are what pilots must always have at all times in all situations otherwise they'll get popped by the FAA. Only recently have digital devices been allowed anywhere NEAR professional cockpits, having been slowly tested in civil aviation. Thus I concluded that an expanding sector with limited knowledge of traditional expectations - airspace 'n shit - might be marketable. Watching your comment turn grey and then to vapor is more "Classic HN" to me.
It's hard to see a market for something already built in for free (airspace restrictions) and anyone familiar with current drones would know this.
There would be value in being able to pull up my phone and find out "Yes, there are no arbitrary restrictions on flying right here".
- FltPlan Go app for android and ios
- skyvector.com
I use the FltPlan Go app when flying, and skyvector.com to look at the charts from a browser.
Not sure of UK coverage though.
But note that no-fly zones are pretty onerous: all the best parks in $town are occluded by the huge zone for an out-of-town airport.
Likewise a local beauty spot that occasionally activates for military training is marked without any timely activation data. Is it hot or not? The zone is larger than the current NOTAM, which suggests they're being completionist, which is maximum ass-covering and minimally useful.
This sort of blunt zoning mostly doesn't make sense, and will likely get ignored.
(in fact, if that same zoning applies to geofences, all the $town flyers own bricks)
Real pilot info is semi-useful: http://notaminfo.com/ukmap ; the legal 400ft limit is 120m, which is an invisible speck in the sky. Useful for setting ceilings for waypoint flight, etc.
In the UK, article 166 and potentially article 167 of the Air Navigation Order (http://publicapps.caa.co.uk/modalapplication.aspx?appid=11&m...) are relevant. In any case, the drone should be within line of sight, lower than 400 feet above ground level, and not be in controlled airspace or near an airport (which should be checked on an aeronautical chart - they're only about £25 and look good on your wall).
This gives a quick summary of both articles: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/drone-rules-everything-...
And bear in mind that there are cases where pilots might be flying light aircraft well below 400 feet AGL away from an aerodrome: during ag operations (crop dusting), during a forced landing, or during a practice forced landing under instruction, so even with the ANO rules there's still potential (albeit unlikely) conflict.
It would be more straightforward to set clear policy and provide a way for drone pilots to know where not to fly (e.g., provide an online map and require altitude telemetry to the controller at all times). Include a link to this information with every drone purchase.
My guess of what will happen if we go down the GPS route: Some incident with a drone will occur, and the pilot will say something like "the drone didn't warn me that I was in a restricted area".
(And if you can't do that safely, given the size and consistent location of the button, you probably shouldn't have a license anyways)
Which is precisely what the app encourages people to do.
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/8135f446be2e4922b27dc3881155e...
I'm calling shenanigans anyways. What on earth is the driver doing for those 27 seconds? How are they determining "full attention"?
The description in the article suggests that the time was counted from the start of the voice command action.
That's not correct. "The most surprising finding was that a driver traveling only 25 mph continues to be distracted for up to 27 seconds after disconnecting from highly distracting phone and car voice-command systems, and up to 15 seconds after disconnecting from the moderately distracting systems."
"Attention" isn't a binary; it's a gradient from full attention to no attention at all.
"With researchers in the car, the drivers were tested for the extent of their distraction, even as they kept their eyes on the road and hands on the wheel after hitting a voice-command system button. A head-mounted LED light flashed red every three to five seconds at the edge of a driver’s left eye. Drivers pressed a switch attached to a thumb when they saw the light. The researchers measured how voice interactions with a car or smartphone reduced drivers’ reaction times and accuracy at seeing the flashing lights. The drivers also completed surveys about their perceived level of distraction, and videos measured how much of the time they kept their eyes on the road, mirrors or dashboard."
Most of the rest are fine.
And it is relevant to you no matter what lane you are in. If there is a car on the shoulder, someone in the right lane could be not paying attention, and swerve into you to avoid that car. Though you should be always on high alert while driving, having a little extra notification and awareness could save your life.
Are you actually arguing that drivers should have less information available to them?
Disclaimer: I use Waze and think it's fucking fantastic and do not understand this stupid brouhaha in this thread.
I'm arguing that drivers should be paying attention to operating their cars instead of their phones.
Then on 101 they'd still be a lane or two away from me, so most of the time it doesn't matter. But someone's car is guaranteed to be broken down somewhere every day, so it just comes up all the time.
BTW, you actually can't turn it off without disabling all Hazards, but the rest of them like "object in lane" seem pretty good.
The pilot can try that line of reasoning, it is (somewhat) valid. But reviewing maps would, ideally, only be made redundant. Since we don't live in an ideal world, it'd still be their responsibility to know where they were flying.
Also, finding a drone operator is not necessarily easy.
That said, 1,700ft is so high, no fly zones don't really mean much anymore.
If we assume you're referring to the United States, don't conflate proposed rules, rules, guidelines, and law, nor circumstances that require you to seek FAA authorization for the flight (which is different than "forbidden by law," itself inaccurate).
You are talking about Advisory Circular 91-57 (Model Aircraft Operating Standards) from June 1981. Not law, just standards for their airspace. Certainly not forbiddance by law.
The CAA sets the laws here
Additionally, if you're flying FPV the ceiling is 1000ft, not 400ft, although you must have a spotter who can maintain unassisted line of sight. Get friends with good eyes, fly further!
How would you expect to hit a plane ?
This whole thing seems overblown. They have no idea what they hit, and it didn't cause any damage to the plane.
This is an amazingly flimsy basis for a headline.
Contrary to popular conception, most airline pilots are very poor at recognising anything that isn't in their company fleet. A few are aircraft enthusiasts, a few are bird spotters. The remainder have knowledge of unexpected flying objects no better than most laymen and a lot worse than a school-age plane spotter.
I used to run aircraft recognition training for a local cadet squadron. The 'pro-pilots' were uniformly awful.
Is there any advance in drone tech to make it quieter? Any time I've been near a drone in operation, the loud buzzing hits a particular psychological frequency (probably the "it's a large flying insect!") that stresses me out.
I don't think I'm alone in this. Other animals seem to dislike drones.
I think most of us animals would mind them less if they were more pleasant-sounding, or closer to silent.
Hitting a commercial jetliner with an off the shelf drone is impossible--especially at that altitude. With $8K it becomes feasible, but I'd put the level of difficulty at about the same as driving a Bugatti Veyron at 70mph in reverse and executing a j-turn (think Hollywood 180 spin) into a tight spot between two SUV's at the grocery store--3 times in a row.
As rare as plastic bags are at 1700 feet, if it was a sunny day in London in an area with a lot of jet traffic, then it was in all likelihood a bag that was kicked up by a car, caught a massive thermal and managed to get blown around by jet traffic.
(1) Fly fixed wing RC in excess of 180mph weekly and have flown quads for 3 years.
For drones, they have systems now that they can deploy to take them down immediately. http://www.skysafe.io/
And please, leave the rest of us who live/visit nowhere near airports alone.
It's all but impossible to take evasive action, you'd have a second or two warning, and quite likely many false alarms.
Rain, bags, random ground echos. Too many targets.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/12034574/P...
This is just D&D is the devil panaroia for 2016
1000s of 'near misses' and no hits is a industry that plane lies.