Drone Hobbyists Angered by Congress Ending the Aerial Wild West
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
I observe that the majority of drone owners use them with a mind to avoid making others ill-at-ease, but y'know, tragedy of the commons and all that
Can you post in a little more detail as just prefixing the bit you disagree with with "not" isn't terribly useful.
People being dicks and drawing unwanted regulatory attention towards themselves and other people ... is just people being dicks.
I appreciate that 'tragedy of the commons' is a very hip phrasing these days, but its usefulness benefits from not being misused.
I would say silence does indeed meet this definition.
Not to say I agree with your dubious attempt at bringing 'silence' into the fold of 'resource'.
When you start mining silence by the barrel from deep space, then we can start treating it as a commodity resource.
Also I'm not sure "zero sum" is the same thing as "limited". The former imposes stricter requirements.
I'm sticking to my guns on this one.
a) I don't know how you'd measure 'all the quiet' to determine that I'd consumed all there was.
b) even if I did, it doesn't prevent you from consuming as much (up to all) of 'the quiet' as you wanted, too.
Which brings us back to why it's not a tragedy of the commons, and why the analogy doesn't work either.
How about, "Drone hobbyists angered at pointless laws that treat their hobby like it's a problem"
100/day is on the same order as the amount of "doing X while black" or "teenagers looking sketchy" complaints that get called in to local police departments across the country. You just don't hear about them because they're thinly distributed to local PD's across the country..
If only 100 people/day are complaining to the government about something then that something isn't a problem.
The relatively small city I live in gets this many or more animal-at-large reports on a daily basis which likely constitute a larger public safety threat than people flying their quads around throughout the entire country.
Where is the regulatory capture on leash laws?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airspace_class_(United_States)
Erm, yes, if you ignore outside factors, they do. In fact, population growth has been a poster child to explain what exponential growth means for a while...
That seems amazingly unlikely.
Drones interfering with manned aircraft or emergency services is already illegal.
And these things are transmitting radio in both directions, putting money into tracking and prosecuting people interfering with flights is completely achievable, without any change in law.
I suspect that this is more about protecting the interests of the commercial businesses by introducing licensing as a barrier to entry.
>The bill is supported by the Commercial Drone Alliance, a Washington-based advocacy group representing Alphabet’s Wing as well as other drone businesses.
[0]: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/crime/man-charged-... (Open in incognito if you run into the paywall) [1]: https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/drone-crashes-ou...
https://www.idahostatejournal.com/members/a-crashed-drone-co...
This one really pissed me off...
I've heard people say that keeping the tankers away when a drone is in the same airspace is an overreaction, but those people are not thinking it through.
There are several factors that make fire-fighting flights very difficult for the pilots.
1. They are flying very low.
2. The air over and around large fires is often very turbulent.
3. The plane is heavily loaded, making it less nimble than normal, and making maneuvers put much more stress on the plane than they would on a less loaded plane.
The pilots are in a dangerous, stressful situation that requires their upmost concentration. Anything that distracts them is dangerous.
People have been killed by RC aircraft. I don't know if any accidents with quadcopters have caused injury (I'd assume having one fall on you from height wouldn't be fun), but there was a story a few years ago where a bloke killed himself with an RC helicopter.
https://nypost.com/2013/09/05/man-decapitated-by-remote-cont...
I thought it was pointless, too, until I saw that video taken from a drone that hovered right above a passenger jet as it was landing at KLAS.
(Sorry I can't search for the video at work — no YT allowed.)
* Is that behavior already illegal under existing law?
* Do these new laws meaningfully address that behavior?
drones will eventually become so heavily licensed than anything outside of law enforcement, large news organizations, and politicians, will be restricted to the point of needing specialized parks just to enjoy them.
RC planes generally fall under 112-95 Section 336 which pretty much should work for drones
There is also a large community of builders and flyers [1], a network of clubs with actual airfields for the purpose, and a multi-million dollar insurance policy with membership.
Both the difficulty, the investment, and the training and peer pressure drastically reduces the number of participants who behave like asshats with their aircraft - to essentially zero.
With hobby drones, it is exactly the opposite -- just go buy some overgrown toy, and you can now put up in the air a device that with any of hundreds of failures of the device or pilot, can become a lethal projectile falling from the sky.
So, yes, serious requirements for anything over a few hundred grams is very reasonable[2].
[1] Academy of Model Aeronautics -- www.modelaircraft.org
[2](no, I'm not implying that the Govt automatically implements every reg in a reasonable & effective way, that could still end badly.)
[Edit: footnotes]
The thing is, these laws are really, really hard to enforce at the federal level and in general municipal and state governments already do an efficient job (and are happy to collect the fines from rich folks with a hobby) executing on local laws.
It's really quite unnecessary.
One is a fine. The other is a few years in prison. It has quite a bit of a deterrent effect. It won't get everyone, but it will cut down on the number of people who try stunts like that.
But drones are hot so why not pass a complex bill with a complex mandate to satisfy regulators itching to pounce on drone hobbyists.
Frankly I assumed the behavior was already criminal under Federal law.[1] Anybody who thought it was okay to buzz airplanes is almost certainly not thinking about consequences.
[1] I'm not completely convinced it's not, FWIW, but I'm satisfied it's not covered by the above, which is the only relevant Federal criminal statute I could find. I'd bet it's already illegal in many states, though.
What changes people's habits is the likelihood of punishment, not the severity of it.
Germany has much lower punishments for murder, but around 90% of murder investigations are solved.
Which of these do you think is the greater deterrence?
Also, now that Germany has...diversity...the crime rate went up pretty significantly.
So I would say, all in all, that homogenous populations are the greatest deterrence, followed by the magnitude of punishment being significantly more important at a societal level, though the risk of getting caught dominates the thought process for regulatory/low-punishment crimes.
When punishments are so disproportionately high a good chunk of the ofenders will stop caring. The preventative effect is gone, it’s more an incentive to escalate the crime to a level where it matches the punishment.
What would be important is forbid passengers planes from flying lower than 500ft.
> What would be important is forbid passengers
> planes from flying lower than 500ft.
Also… mighty fast 'drone', to nearly accelerate to the speed of a landing jet. I don't think they make quadcopters quite that brisk yet.
We must be thinking of different encounter videos. In the one I saw, the drone didn’t move much. It sat in the flight path waiting for a jet to come by.
The good drone operators didn't get control over the bad ones, so here we are.
What does this even mean? I buy a drone and now I'm responsible to go hunt down every idiot with a drone and tell him to knock it off? I'm sure that would be very effective. Definitely much more effective than the FAA regulations already in place that these people choose to ignore.
Instead, they spent their political capital fighting regulations instead of making good ones that the FAA could simply adopt wholesale.
Because of that, the FAA stepped in and now everybody gets to deal with the fallout.
I've been hit by an admittedly, fairly small drone. I't didn't hurt much at all, and the rotors didn't break the skin. I don't think they're like aerial blades, unless someone attaches some to one.
Those small toy drones? Yeah, might cut you a bit if the rotor cages aren't installed.
Something heavier like a DJI Phantom? Even if the blades don't cut you, those carry enough mass/speed to seriously injure.
Taking it to the absurd, if you get hit by one of those Reapers[0] you might get really seriously injured!
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Atomics_MQ-9_Reaper
All the uncontrolled airports near me have to have drone advisories because nobody respects the 400' or line of sight regulations. I was landing on 35 at KTHV last year and nearly hit a drone at almost 900' turning to downwind to base.
There needs to be registration and regulation so that when you as a drone operator violate airspace regulations you can be punished.
The problematic portion for drone hobbyists is "S.2836 - Preventing Emerging Threats Act of 2018" that was attached to the FAA Reauthorization bill. https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/283...
In it's current form, it has some really vague wording and definitions. For example, the bill frequently refers to "threat" without a solid definition. It basically says that "threat" will be defined by the Secretary or Attorney General at a later time.
Well no, 'threat' is not being defined by the Sec/AG at a later time, it's right there. Where I will concede to your point is that in the context of unmanned aerial flight, actions by the pilot that satisfy the above are not well enumerated or defined-but I'm only partially through reading the text of the bill.
Here's a paraphrase: In defining the term threat, The Secretary or the Attorney shall take into account factors such as potential for harm, loss of life, national security, and economic damage.
That is not a definition, that is a list of things that must be taken into account when making the definition.
tl;dr - Pilots may not engage in action(s) that constitute a 'threat', nebulously defined, but the AG may engage in action(s) in response, more expressly defined.
At least that's how I've initially read the proposed changes to this Reauthorization bill.
Edit: fwiw, I think we're both in agreement, however the ends-that the proposal does not go far enough to detail the actions of operators.
"Noscitur a sociis: A latin term for 'it is known by the company it keeps', it is the concept that the intended meaning of an ambiguous word depends on the context in which it is used." https://thelawdictionary.org/noscitur-a-sociis/
that is the definition of "a law to be arbitrarily enforced". I guess they do not want any minority flying drones.
"(2) REQUIREMENTS.—In taking the actions described in subsection (b)(1), the Secretary or the Attorney General, as the case may be, shall—
(A) avoid infringement of the privacy and civil liberties of the people of the United States and the freedom of the press consistent with Federal law and the Constitution of the United States, including with regard to the testing of any equipment and the interception or acquisition of unmanned aircraft or systems;"
See y'all in court.
Mostly because as as a remote pilot, I have a feeling the proposals may be much less onerous than we're being lead to believe by Bloomberg here and what hobbyist groups are complaining about.
Stated as a Licensed Part 107 operator. I think everyone should be required to undergo some kind of training, with tiers for educational, hobbyist, and commercial. I learned a lot more in those classes than just how to fly a Phantom DJI and found the regulatory knowledge alone to be HIGHLY insightful.
If it hits your windscreen, you were more likely driving where you shouldn’t be rather than someone with a literal kids toy doing something wrong.
Also nobody flies those toys in airfields. They're barely suited for backyards as they are.
Do you routinely stop what you're doing to listen to random people that claim that they're more of an authority on various aspects of your life?
Yes, regardless of what I'm working on, be it construction/maintenance on my house, basic electrical or plumbing work, driving my car, handling/transporting a firearm, and any other number of cases I have to stop and listen to "random people" i.e. cops, regulators, politicians, FAA, and whoever else regardless of how I feel about them because they are, unfortunately or not, the authority
Completely agree! Children should be allowed to play with toy guns in public areas.
Among the requirements for recreational use is "(7) The operator has passed an aeronautical knowledge and safety test described in subsection (g) and administered by the Federal Aviation Administration online for the operation of unmanned aircraft systems and maintains proof of test passage to be made available to the Administrator or law enforcement upon request."
[1] https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/4/te...
Frustratingly the story doesn't specify a bill number, which makes it harder than it should be to track down the actual text.
I found some discussion of it on the AMA's Government Relations blog (see https://amablog.modelaircraft.org/amagov/2018/09/26/faa-reau...) -- but confusingly, they cite the relevant bill as "H.R. 302," which if you look it up on Congress.gov is actually a bill titled the "Sports Medicine Licensure Clarity Act of 2017" (see https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/302/...) which has nothing at all to do with UAVs.
I then searched Congress.gov for the bill title they gave, the "FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018", and found H.R. 4, which appears to be the actual bill in question. The UAV-specific part of the bill is Title 2, Subtitle B ("Unmanned Aircraft Systems"), which can be jumped to directly here: https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/4/te...
The bill would have the newer parts of the hobby (like those aerial photography drones) join in the self-regulation that AMA has been doing satisfactorily for ages. Sensible and not very controversial for most.
But it also puts the hobby directly under the authority of the FAA in a way that it hasn't ever been before. This gives FAA the ability to impose new regulations directly on hobbyists without the input that would happen in either congressional legislation or community group standards.
That is an epic big deal from the point of view of the old hobbyists and the new.
I do not see this at all with the drone pilot community. It's a community of individuals. And even if it's less than 1% of the total drone pilot population, there is a real problem with this bizarre demand that they have a right to do what they want. They do not. This is shared space. Ham radio operators have more rules, testing, peer review and community than recreational drone pilots.
There are at least 3 distinct groups potentially impacted by this. First there are the non-commercial, "toy" users that are flying around cheap little "smart" drones using phones. Most of this class are using drones under 5" and that weigh negligible amounts. The second class are the non-commercial hobbyists that mostly build their own drones and use them either for recreational freestyle or racing. These drones can be anywhere from 3" all the way up to 12" on the extreme end, and similarly have a very wide weight and performance envelope. Much of the equipment in this class requires Ham licenses, or in some cases other federal licensing. Lastly there are the commercial operators that are mostly using drones for aerial photography. These tend to be medium to large sized drones (everything from 6" all the way to multiple foot wide monstrosities) which most definitely require FAA licenses to operate.
Part of the problem here, is that each of these groups has different expectations. Little Timmy getting the 4" plastic drone he flies with his iPhone for Christmas shouldn't really be required to pass a FAA license to fly it around his backyard. The professional across the street with access to the 5 foot wide 150 pound hexacopter with the gyrostabilized 4k camera mount and an effective range measured in miles probably should have some kind of license. The guy who built his own 5" drone out of parts and tools around the local park probably falls somewhere in the middle. Lumping all drones under one single set of regulations really isn't going to work because not all drones are the same. It would be like trying to cover unicycles, bicycles, segways, and motorcycles with a single set of regulations just because they all had less than four wheels and required you to balance on them.
1) that category of person already had to have a license (a license I hold) before this new bill and does require testing.
2) that size drone weighs nothing near 150lb. I have a commercial grade 5 foot octocopter with advanced gyro and a professional grade dSLR and fully loaded (drone, battery, comms, gyro, camera and lens) it’s under 25lbs.
Right. And that community, the Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA) is probably doomed if these new rules pass. A lot of their models can go faster than 100 MPH and higher than 400 feet. A lot of their fields are in controlled airspace where they won't be allowed to fly.
THAT was the wild west.
Edit: to clarify, these are 'real' aircraft that humans can fly in.
https://www.eaa.org/en/eaa/aviation-communities-and-interest...
(1) Weighs less than 254 pounds empty weight, excluding floats and safety devices which are intended for deployment in a potentially catastrophic situation;
(2) Has a fuel capacity not exceeding 5 U.S. gallons;
(3) Is not capable of more than 55 knots calibrated airspeed at full power in level flight; and
(4) Has a power-off stall speed which does not exceed 24 knots calibrated airspeed.
God Bless America!
> OMFG so if I can build a thing within
> these constraints I can fly it?
The funny thing is he's about the only one I'd actually like to meet in person. Nothing against the other folks (Mark Rober from above seems really nice), Peter just seems like he'd be fun to hang out with and build something.
Worth it. ;-P
* Someone flies a drone into a government facility with an explosive | camera | contraband?
* Public figure/celebrity or official assassinated by drone
* Drone causes infrastructure damage or transportation accident
* Drone used for spying /financial gain
---
Honestly, the lack of the above happening in any large scale, notable or meaningful way shows that there arent a ton of people out there looking to wreak havoc with drones.
What I am surprised by is there are not yet a range of security services based on drones - i.e. a swarm of autonomous drone cameras which patrol a given asset/area where they autonomously recharge themselves and fly around - coupled with motion sensors/proximity sensors that being triggered are dispatched to investigate.
Someone flies a drone into a government
facility with an explosive | camera |
contraband?
Public figure/celebrity or official
assassinated by drone
Drone causes infrastructure damage or
transportation accident
Drone used for spying /financial gain
---
Seriously the asymetic warfare from relatively cheap drones is a massive problem. The US has fired patriot missiles are little more then ~$300 hobbyist drones carrying hand grenades.
I am perfectly aware of military use of drones. I was referring to the hobbiest movement's potential use of drones for 'domestic terrorism'.
I fully expect that this WILL happen here in the US, and I am surprised that it has not happened already.
Stop being so US centric. The future is well distributed.
Their industrial and weapon potential is not very high (they could drop one or two grenades I guess?) but their ability to gather intelligence quickly and safely in urban environments is extremely high.
Get a camera with good lense..
Or you know you can just order satellite pictures of the area you want spied on. Legaly and commercially.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/07/08/485262777...
When I saw that, I realised that there are too many assholes in the world to allow unregulated drones. Some people will invade the privacy of others without any thought, and the only course of action is to require registration of drones.
It's a shame -- I'm sure there are plenty of responsible drone pilots out there. But the jerks ruin it for everyone.
This is a pretty incredible claim. I think your friends may have been exaggerating things or you misunderstood.
The governments of the world have entirely dropped the ball on anti-collision systems for small aircraft up to now. I anticipate them doing no better now that there are even smaller aircraft added to the mix.
City of LA is now issuing permits for this kind of issue
Excerpt: The city and the county of Los Angeles have issued nearly 60 permits for drones on film and TV sets in the last year, according to data from FilmL.A., which handles permits for the Los Angeles region. In addition to the permits, applications for drone waivers have poured in, with more than 200 companies and individuals requesting authorisation from the FAA to operate drones for film production, per the FAA website.
full article: https://beth.technology/drones-over-hollywood-an-aerial-view...
The law also weighs into the controversial issue of whether drones should have radio beacons that identify their position and registered owner. It would grant the Federal Aviation Administration the authority to require that. The agency is drafting such a regulation at the request of homeland security and law enforcement agencies and has signaled it may require retrofitting millions of drones already in use.
Autonomous drones are far cheaper to produce than automobiles. And what if an autonomous drone drops grenades in a public area? Who do you blame? How does the law prevent further issues?
We better crack down on unidentified drones.
1- https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/04/world/americas/venezuelan...
2- https://www.jpost.com/Breaking-News/Two-arrested-in-Denmark-...
I believe these kinds of measures will be put in place for drones as well: only certified drones with enforced technical limitations of speed and height, certified operators only ,and remotely visible (rfid) license plates.
Most of regulations you mention also do nothing to stop cars from being used as weapons, so they are completely irrelevant to your point.
The few regulations you mentioned that do provide some deterrent to being used as weapons weren't intended for that purpose, and are easily circumvented by determined attackers anyway.
Drones in the skies aren't necessarily easily concealable either. If they are requires to have some sort of identifier (RFID), it's not too hard to check what's in the skies, or note what's lower around points of interest.
Both cars and drones are fairly easily transported by other vehicles. Cars may require a trailer, open or enclosed, but it's hardly rare to see. Drones are slightly easier to transport in that respect, but not enough that I think it makes a difference.
Drones can fly either high enough to not be easily seen (and they are too small to show up on most radars) Or they can be launched near a target and fly low.
>Both cars and drones are fairly easily transported by other vehicles.
But you need another licensed vehicle at that point to transport it. You can put a drone in a backpack and walk, ride a bike, take a bus etc...
>Drones are slightly easier to transport in that respect, but not enough that I think it makes a difference.
You think that a 2 pound drone is only "slightly easier" to transport surreptitiously than a 2 ton car?
By eye, yes. By digital camera? That would have to be pretty high. At least on clear days. But there are days where visibility is low in general, and that goes for cars too.
> Or they can be launched near a target and fly low.
High risk targets should have additional safeguards. It's not hard for cars to get to some locations just because they aren't allowed, but because there is additional security and physical obstructions. One solution never covers all cases, and we shouldn't expect it to.
> But you need another licensed vehicle at that point to transport it.
Or you hire someone to tow it. Yes, it's harder. But also it's not like every time you get behind the wheel of a car someone checks that you're licensed. How many times have you had your license checked while driving? How many hours have you driven?
> You think that a 2 pound drone is only "slightly easier" to transport surreptitiously than a 2 ton car?
I think in the case you are planning to use it illegally, it's not really that much of a difference.
Seriously, you can probably walk into any rundown part of town, buy some older beat up car for cash for under $1000 dollars, and immediately use it for your purpose while the title change is in the mail (for states that allow that), if the person selling it really even cares.
Drones are new, so there's less infrastructure to track and manage them, but it's not really all that different IMO, it's just a matter of time.
I think you've done a great job illustrating why similar laws requiring licensing and registration will be completely ineffective at stopping terrorist from using drones, which is the context of this whole discussion.
Have you ever seen a hobby drone flown? I challenge you to see a typical model flying at 250ft feet with anything not using a telephoto lens, even on a clear day, unless you already knew where it was (aka saw it from a lower altitude and followed it up).
Do you think you could identity a drone moving at 50 feet using a video camera that recorded as 640x480? Because approximately the same number of pixels would by used on a 4k capable video camera at 250 feet, and that's before any optical zoom at all. As long as you can identify something moving, it can be zoomed in on and classified (either by the same camera or a secondary one dedicated to the task), or just give the camera more pixels and use digital zoom. A few of those in a cluster would cover an area quite well I think.
For another way to think of this, an object that is 8" (assuming a 12" drone at an angle) should appear to be a quarter the size of the moon to the naked eye at 300 feet.[1] I don't think that's something a good quality camera should have trouble picking up.
1: http://www.1728.org/angsize.htm, input angle in minutes 7.5, size .666, using their example which says the moon appears to be about 40 minutes in angle size.
If a drone was a solid spherical mass like the moon, your guesstimate might have some merit, but it’s not. In reality, your 8” is already way overshooting it. Furthermore, the amount of light reflecting by the moon is significantly higher providing much higher contrast for edge detection. The matte white plastic of many common drones however easily blends into the sky.
Am I saying no camera would do it? No, that’s obviously wrong. But the post I replied to used a very vague wording which implies a majority of cameras would do it, which is definitely not the case. Happy to provide real photos to inspect this weekend (assuming it’s not still raining) at 100, 200, 300, and 350ft at whatever megapixel you’d like (up to 22mp) and focal length (from 8-1600mm, 35mm equivalent) so you can see what I mean.
Given the body area of most these drones, I'm not so sure. I'd best the visible cross-section is pretty close to 64 sq. inches from most angles, if you include the small amount of area from the arms, but ignoring rotors.
> But the post I replied to used a very vague wording which implies a majority of cameras would do it
I don't read what I said that way. I said a digital camera, as in there exists a camera or type of camera that would work. I mean, there's some pretty crappy digital cameras out there, if you want to go really cheap.
> Happy to provide real photos to inspect this weekend (assuming it’s not still raining) at 100, 200, 300, and 350ft at whatever megapixel you’d like (up to 22mp) and focal length (from 8-1600mm, 35mm equivalent) so you can see what I mean.
Sure, I would be interested in see how it looks in practice. I purposefully limited myself to a little over 8 megapixels (4k) as I assumed video, and that's fairly easy to get with consumer grade hardware, which sets a nice precedent. If cheap consumer grade hardware can do it, a government solution with possibly special purpose hardware would have no problem.
Knowing how a decent still camera views it at full res with little or no zoom would be a good way to look at is, as I think that would approximate a high-end video system, or a mid-range one in a couple years.
I get emails on replies, so I shouldn't miss it even if it's a few days later.
The moon is illuminated by the sun, so not really a fair comparison. Take a drone and paint it the color of the sky and it's going to be a lot more difficult than “a quarter the size of the moon” would imply. A drone can also fly much higher than 300 feet, and it's not a solid object.
But I've written a fair bit of object detection code though, and I'm certain a decent camera could do it fairly accurately.
False positives are the problem though. Birds, airplanes (farther away), insects (closer to the camera), clouds. All of those things are much more common than drones and so even a very small false positive percentage is going to cause this system to be completely unreliable.
That’s all without even mentioning licensed drones. How will the system handle not sounding the alarm when it detects a licensed drone? All drones will have transponders I assume? So now the camera needs a radio, and access to a national database of transponder codes.
Assuming drones become more popular how does the camera know which transponder code belongs to which drone? Signal strength? This will be different depending on environment. Signal direction? You need multiple receivers for this.
How do you stop a drone from emulating another drone’s transponder code? A challenge response system with a public/private key pair?
And the most important question yet. What do you do when you spot an unauthorized drone? If a cop spots a car he can chase it.
Does each camera have an interceptor drone?
How does the interceptor drone bring down the unauthorized drone without causing any collateral damage? What happens if there are multiple unauthorized drones in an area? How do you trace the unauthorized drone back to the owner? Unlike a car, the operator isn't in the vehicle.
Do you just allow the cameras to hand off monitoring to other nearby cameras until it lands and send cops to deal with it? How do you build a camera network with enough cameras to provide continuous monitoring, taking into account trees and buildings.
All of that just to say yeah it’s possible, but it’s a lot harder and a lot more expensive than it seems. Much too hard and much too expensive to feasible anytime soon. Unless drones prove to be a lot more popular and effective than truck, car, and suitcase bombs, than I think they will, no one is going to pay for all of this.
That’s not to say that we won’t have more licensing and registration for drones, but I don’t think it’s going to prove very enforceable or very effective at anything more than reducing the number of nuisance complaints. Maybe it’s worth it just to do that, but I’d need to see real data first.
That's also not to say that some kind of automated drone defense won't almost certainly become more popular in very specific high security areas like the White House.
A good point. I think flying above 400 ft is already illegal though, so dealing with that might be somewhat simplified.
> All drones will have transponders I assume?
I think that might be a fair assumption. We require license plates for vehicles on the road, requiring transponders for use in populated areas sounds like a good way to track and license (if your transponder is issued, there you go).
> So now the camera needs a radio, and access to a national database of transponder codes.
Well, yeah. If it's a system responsible for tracking and ensuring licensing compliance and flight permission, it would, just as bridge toll systems now often use license plates to track fees. It's not all that hard in this day and age.
> Assuming drones become more popular how does the camera know which transponder code belongs to which drone? Signal strength? This will be different depending on environment. Signal direction? You need multiple receivers for this.
You already likely need multiple systems to get good visual and radio coverage. But even then, it doesn't need to be a perfectly self-contained system, just a piece of the puzzle. If you see six objects and receive 5 signals, eliminate the ones you can, and send someone to investigate with directional equipment.
We don't expect red-light cameras to pull us over, but we do expect they do something. It's not crazy to expect they also might have specific circumstances that flag to additional review for possible dispatch of an officer.
> How do you stop a drone from emulating another drone’s transponder code? A challenge response system with a public/private key pair?
How do you keep one car from using another's license plate? You make the sale of fake license plates illegal, you make sure the only valid plates are issued by the government, and you make it illegal to tamper with them.
> And the most important question yet. What do you do when you spot an unauthorized drone? If a cop spots a car he can chase it.
Already covered a little above, but there's already solutions appearing to help with this. There's anti-drone ammunition[1] and trained animals[2] on the simple end, up to military grade anti-drone solutions.
> How does the interceptor drone bring down the unauthorized drone without causing any collateral damage? What happens if there are multiple unauthorized drones in an area? How do you trace the unauthorized drone back to the owner? Unlike a car, the operator isn't in the vehicle.
What do we do with vehicles or trailers without clearly defined ownership we find on the street? It's towed to an impound lot. If someone wants to claim property, they they come for it.
If downing it for legitimate reasons ensues, the owner of the drone would be responsible for damage, and if the owner can't be determined, I'm sure there's a legal precedent to fall back on. It's not that wild a situation.
> All of that just to say yeah it’s possible, but it’s a lot harder and a lot more expensive than it seems. Much too hard and much too expensive to feasible anytime soon. Unless drones prove to be a lot more popular and effective than truck, car, and suitcase bombs, than I think they will, no one is going to pay for all of this.
I don't think it's nearly that expensive, as outlined above. If there isn't something like this, I expect drone terrorism would definitely be the go-to solution. This wouldn't stop that, but it does put a hurdle in the way (in the same way that doors and locks and security systems put a hurdle in the way of a home invader, but in the end only slow and dissuade, and do not actually prevent in most cases).
1: https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2017/03/23/usaf-anti-dro...
So is using a drone for a terrorist act, so by that logic, wouldn’t that negate the need for this system you propose?
> I don't think it's nearly that expensive, as outlined above.
To cover what area? If you mean something like the White House, sure, the cost would very likely be justified.
If you are talking covering the entire United States, or even just everything important, you are insane (not meant to be rude, but a trillion dollars wouldn’t be unrealistic estimate there).
I think a key point you are missing is what real threat a consumer grade drone is in reality.
$500 Drone - might be able to lift a hand grenade. Keyword there might.
$1500 Drone - the hand grenade is now pretty solidly possible depending on the type of grenade (M67, doable, but anything bigger less likely). In the best case you might get up to a pound of cargo weight, but it’s significantly going to impact maneuverability and flight time.
$10k+ drone - once we get into this category, sure, we can get up to 5lbs or maybe slightly higher in cargo weight, but then we are in the category of 4ft or larger hexacopters or octocopters. They are very noticeable and very loud.
I think that’s the real reason we’ve not seen much (and likely won’t see much unless drones dramatically change in lifting capacity) terrorism from drones. To put it bluntly, there are just too many ways to deliver tiny explosives that are more practical and less likely to fail than are with drones. For the realistic payload of something like an M67 grenade, the “kill radius” is only 5 meters. If I saw a drone with something attached to it (or even if not) within 5m of me, I’m already going to be getting out of the area. Sure, you could argue someone may intend to drop it from altitude, but even then do you really think the accuracy of dropping something like that is actually going to be very precise?
The terrorism angle is in reality pure FUD and is used as an excuse to appeal to the uninformed masses.
No, I'm just noting that however we deal with this for aircraft might help here, since the same rules apply.
> To cover what area? If you mean something like the White House, sure, the cost would very likely be justified.
High risk locations. Dense metro downtowns, sports stadiums, government buildings, large public utilities (nuclear power plants), etc.
> If you are talking covering the entire United States, or even just everything important, you are insane (not meant to be rude, but a trillion dollars wouldn’t be unrealistic estimate there).
Assuming 10,000 locations across the U.S., and assuming 50 $50,000 average installation cost (which might be low, but we can scale it easily for ballpark costs after), that's $500 million. If we double locations and quadruple average install cost (which is supposed to account for locations with multiple towers, etc), that's still just $8 billion. That's totally doable when it comes to stuff tagged as national defense.
> I think a key point you are missing is what real threat a consumer grade drone is in reality.
Your prices and payloads are way off. A few grand ($3k-$6k) gets you 20 lbs of payload easily (and more if you need it), from multiple manufacturers.[1] $10k seems to get you like 40 lbs or more.
> For the realistic payload of something like an M67 grenade, the “kill radius” is only 5 meters.
Grenades are not optimized for damage. They are a compromise that takes into account explosive power, compact size, and delivery. The fact they are meant to be hand delivered to within a few tens of feet means a large blast radius is actually detrimental to their design. 10+ lbs of payload for something that would want the maximum blast radius and power, or the maximum directed penetration for hard targets, probably allows for quite a different set of compromises.
> The terrorism angle is in reality pure FUD and is used as an excuse to appeal to the uninformed masses.
There's a lot of FUD, but I don't think it's complete FUD. It's a real attack vector, and if there's no mitigations, I think it's possible it will have the best cost to benefit ratio (since the chances of finding the perpetrator would be virtually nil, and the cost is relatively low), and that's all it takes for it to be used.
1: https://filmora.wondershare.com/drones/top-heavy-lift-drones...
You take out dense metro downtowns and I think that's perfectly sensible.
It doesn't require any kind of licensing, or national database, or wide scale distributed systems of any kind. Drones are off limits in the those areas just like aircraft are. If you have an automated defense system and you need a drone for some exceptional reason, you clear it with whoever manages the local system and they install a friend or foe transponder on the drone.
Wide scale drone licensing enforcement isn't required or effective if your goal is to protect high threat targets from drone attacks. It solves completely different problems.
>No, I'm just noting that however we deal with this for aircraft might help here, since the same rules apply.
You need a much higher density of radar installations, with an exponentially higher cost since drones are much smaller than aircraft.
>$8 billion
That's off by a few orders of magnitude if you're talking about a wide-scale system including towers, radar, personnel, drone take down capability etc...
>10+ lbs of payload for something that would want the maximum blast radius and power, or the maximum directed penetration for hard targets
You’re still talking pipe bomb levels. It’s still much more effective to leave a bag in a trashcan in a crowded space.
> A few grand ($3k-$6k) gets you 20 lbs of payload easily (and more if you need it), from multiple manufacturers.[1] $10k seems to get you like 40 lbs or more.
You're looking at a list of maximum payloads from the marketing department. Not maximum realistic operational loads. And the drones with 40lb payloads are huge.
>It's a real attack vector, and if there's no mitigations,
There are no feasible large scale mitigations that are effective enough to change the calculus.
Again if you’re talking local mostly automated drone defense, then sure that’s feasible and probably necessary at some point.
For example, drone payload, where you focus on smaller sizes, and say they can't do much damage, and then either ignore larger size payloads as marketing lies (with no evidence to back it up, or to at least show actual payloads in practice), or that those drones are huge... which would make them easier to track, which was one of my earlier points that makes the system easier to develop. Feasible drones for attacks will likely be larger, and this easier to detect.
Time an again, I've tried to come up with real data or approximate numbers, with all calculations and reasons for such outlined so you or anyone else could question where you thought my assumptions were wrong, but I haven't seen that. Instead, I get blanket rejections without evidence, or even much explanation of reasoning.
You could fairly easily find a drone with a 10 lbs payload. 40 pounds though isn't a realistic operational payload for those drones, which is why it says "max payload".
>Feasible drones for attacks will likely be larger, and this easier to detect
That's true, my point is that setting up a nationwide drone licensing and tracking system to track hobby drones isn't necessary when what you're really worried about is protecting high value targets from drones that are approaching the size of small helicopters.
> Instead, I get blanket rejections without evidence, or even much explanation of reasoning.
You haven't provided any evidence either, just a random assumption that such a system will cost $50k-$200k per site.
I clearly explained why that is too low. Increasing the density of radar coverage to handle drones above 400', trained personnel, towers, and drone take down systems are going to cost a lot more than you think. You can believe me or not, but I've provided at least much explanation and evidence as you have.
I know you weren't the prior commentor. This is a long discussion. I expect you're reading the prior comments in the same direct thread. When I've specifically addressed an item, in the thread, or even in the same comment, to have that ignored is... frustrating.
> You could fairly easily find a drone with a 10 lbs payload. 40 pounds though isn't a realistic operational payload for those drones, which is why it says "max payload".
I didn't pull that number out of my ass. It was actually a conservative number, based on what I saw some models as capable of (but could not find good pricing info for). For example, the VulcaUAV Airlist model advertises a payload capacity of 25kg (~55lbs).[1]
> That's true, my point is that setting up a nationwide drone licensing and tracking system to track hobby drones isn't necessary when what you're really worried about is protecting high value targets from drones that are approaching the size of small helicopters.
Not just hobby drones, all drones. I expect there to to be a lot of commercial drone usage in the future. If they are all licensed, then the costs are limited to applying towards the small hobby usage, but overall U.S. drone usage, which I expect to be substantial compared to hobby use.
I've explained this multiple times.
> You haven't provided any evidence either, just a random assumption that such a system will cost $50k-$200k per site.
I've explained what type of hardware I expect the system to require, including multiple cameras per station. I've given a guesstimate as to the number of installations required. I've guessed at a per-station cost, and thus a total system cost.
Your counter of "it's off by a few orders of magnitude" is in my opinion not sufficiently explained by personnel and countermeasures, since a few order of magnitude is at a minimum 100x off (and then if I assume you used a meaning of "few" that includes 2 as the minimum). I do not believe training existing personnel that are already stationed around every location (police!) you would want these and providing additional devices and training constitutes hundreds of billions of dollars.
> I've provided at least much explanation and evidence as you have.
No, you haven't provided any idea of what you think it would actually cost to have personnel on site and have them trained and outfitted. If you had, I might have been able to point out that we already have officials that serve a very similar purpose that could be used, the police, and that I don't think training and outfitting would be nearly as costly. I think $100 billion would be an fairly extreme upper bound of this system, but that's not a few orders of magnitude, it's one, and surmountable over time with a tiered rollout IMO, if it's event that high. For example, the FAA alone out of all the DOT agencies has a $16 billion annual budget.[2] In 2018 the U.S. spent over $90 billion on transportation in the federal budget.[3]
In the end, I doubt we're going to convince each other of anything at this point, and I've lost the desire to continue. We should just agree to disagree. :/
Feel free to address any of the points I've made here though. I'll read the response and consider the points, I just don't think I'll respond.
1: http://vulcanuav.com/aircraft/
2: https://www.transportation.gov/mission/budget/fy-2019-budget...
3: https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/federal_budget_detail_f...
I read your earlier source. And I'm telling you that a list of drone maximum payloads pulled from the marketing websites of mostly small businesses isn't representative of the actual normal operating payloads of drones at those price points.
Most drones can technically take off with a much higher weight than is actually practical to fly with.
I'm not saying you can't find a gas powered drone with a 100 pound payload. What I am saying is that these drones aren’t remotely in the same category as consumer drones.
>Not just hobby drones, all drones. I expect there to to be a lot of commercial drone usage in the future. If they are all licensed, then the costs are limited to applying towards the small hobby usage, but overall U.S. drone usage, which I expect to be substantial compared to hobby use.
Then what is the point in regulating tiny drones with little capability to cause damage. Ultralight aircraft aren’t regulated like commercial jets.
>Your counter of "it's off by a few orders of magnitude" is in my opinion not sufficiently explained by personnel and countermeasures, since a few order of magnitude is at a minimum 100x off
This depends on what you’re trying to do. If your goal is just to make sure that commercial drones are licensed, then sure you could build a relatively cheap system. If your goal is just:
Hey we keep seeing an unlicensed drone delivering pizzas. Alert the police to go out with direction finding equipment when they get the time, and see if they can find the operator, so that we can fine him.
Then sure a few billion is doable. Red light cameras don’t deter terrorist from using truck bombs though. If we removed the requirement to have license plates tomorrow, we wouldn’t see a huge upswing in truck bombings. Stealing a license plate isn’t the bottleneck in the terrorists plan.
So if your goal is to meaningfully deter determined attackers, you’ll need a system that’s much more robust. You’ll need enough extra trained personnel to rapidly respond to a relatively large percentage of every unauthorized drone alarm. You’ll need a very dense network of anti drone countermeasures (birds, guns whatever) in order to have a chance of responding in time. You’ll need vastly expanded radar coverage to detect drones flying too high to be detected by camera. And a camera network that is dense enough so that just flying behind building and trees isn’t an easy option. All of this will need to coordinated.
>In 2018 the U.S. spent over $90 billion on transportation in the federal budget.
That's in one year, and the DOT doesn’t operate anything close to the scale of the system we’re talking about.
I’d actually argue it’s not possible with current radar tech. The radar signature of most consumer drones is so small that if you had radar tuned to that size, you’d be getting false positives all the time. Even in the bigger drones, there’s still a very small radar signature too. I’ve not tested it, but even my 6’ wide dual octocopter likely wouldn’t even be identified on radar.
Actually, my numbers aren’t off (and the companies aren’t lying in their marketing directly), it’s simply a misunderstanding over the units of scale.
For purposes of discussion, I’m going to focus on the payload numbers used in the link you provided, not manufacturer spec sheets as they vary a lot in terminology. I also own three of the drones listed in that link too, so what I’m saying isn’t hypothetical assumptions, but real world experience.
Let’s also use the DJI S1000 (but I’m happy to break it down for others too) for this discussion. The article claims a payload capacity of 7kg. This is actually a bit off flat out as the max takeoff weight is 11kg and the drone in question weighs 4.4kg. So our number is actually 6.6kg for payload. The biggest disconnect though is that the 4.4kg is just the airframe / motors / props / mcu, it doesn’t include the batteries (biggest impact) or some other needed electronics. Unlike with your average consumer drone, batteries are something you have wide control over in size, weight, and capacity. That said, unless you want to only fly a very short distance (think short walking range), you are still stuck with a heavy pack. On the low end, expect about 2kg, on the high end 3kg. That puts us under 4kg of payload now. If we want to see where it’s going (allowing us to be further away from this hypothetical bomb) or have more telemetry, we are going to be getting closer to the 3kg payload mark. Now let’s talk about price. These big drones are money pits. Sure, you see those $3-6k price tags advertised, but the part you don’t realize until you get into the field is that’s not a “flight ready” price. You are going to need batteries, radios, battery chargers, etc etc to actually be able to fly. For these big drones, you’ll spend >$500 just for one flight’s worth of batteries if done right. Shockingly, for a good battery charger, you’ll spend nearly a grand. For an appropriate radio, $500. You want remote video too? That’s another $1-2k, not including a gyro or camera. Heck, I spent pretty close to $1000 just on the carrying case for my S1000. Yes, a terrorist would likely cut a lot of corners, but it’s still going to be a lot more than the base sticker price you see advertised and my number of $10k is a fair median point for what it’d really cost on these bigger drones. Could you do it cheaper, yes, but my numbers are still in the right ballpark.
—
I agree with your later point to another person, I don’t think this venue is encouraging a healthy discussion. You come off as someone intelligent, just not personally experienced in this field. As such, I’d be more than happy to continue the discussion offline. Shoot me an email if interested, info in my profile.
I suspected this (it wasn't spelled out, but became likely as I was researching). That said, I think it's somewhat mitigated by the fact long flights wouldn't really be necessary. Enough battery to fly the route and perform the end action, with some sufficient overhead (an additional 50-100% capacity?) would possibly be sufficient. A few minutes of flight time likely gets you quite far.
That said, it also works towards my point of specific areas that are tracked may be sufficient. If it's hard to fly a drone from miles away to avoid launch site detection and still have a delivery payload large enough to be useful, that's beneficial in itself.
> my number of $10k is a fair median point for what it’d really cost on these bigger drones.
Fair enough. I agree that actual deployment is probably either an additional $5k-$10 or some multiple of the base price, depending on how some items scale.
It leaves the question open as to whether the larger drones could still be useful though. Being able to fly a bomb up to a corner office in some building and detonate it, or quickly drop down to a motorcade someone has entered, might be a good return on investment even at $30 or more, depending on the target.
> just not personally experienced in this field
That's correct, and it's why I value your input on this, since you seem to have a lot of experience with the actual drone portion.
I don't mind being proven wrong, or shown evidence I'm wrong or off in calculations. I do mind just being told in wrong without new number or without specific objections provided as to my methodology, since I went through the effort to provide them in the first place. As such, I appreciate you providing some real numbers to specific models for this discussion.
> I’d be more than happy to continue the discussion offline.
I appreciate the offer (I really do!), but I'm worn out by this discussion at this point.
Additionally, I doubt we'll make much headway on the actual tracking system part of the discussion, there's too many variables, and too much variation in our different ideas of what those variables entail. As those variables stack and the differences multiply, the expected end values diverge too wildly.
Since I think neither of us have enough hard data to reduce enough of those variables to fairly static values without quite a bit of research on each (such as how many priority targets are there, how the military treats this topic, current state of the art video tracking techniques, the effect of weather on video tracking, etc, and truthfully that's a lot to invest in an internet discussion), it seems unlikely to be all that fruitful. :/
Building an effective IED that can be transported by a drone is already much harder than bypassing any realistic national anti drone defense. Who is this system mean to stop?
>A good point. I think flying above 400 ft is already illegal though, so dealing with that might be somewhat simplified.
We are talking about determined attackers, so it being illegal isn't really relevant. Unless you want to cover the country in radar that can track anything the size of a drone that’s above 400’, so the camera system on has to handle below 400’. That’s possible, but now we’re adding hundreds of billions more to the system.
>just as bridge toll systems now often use license plates to track fees. It's not all that hard in this day and age.
Bridge toll systems are nothing like the proposed system. There is a huge difference between building a camera that takes pictures of license plate that sends a ticket in the mail weeks later, and a distributed system with hundreds of thousands of access points that each need to access a national database to make decisions in real time.
>We don't expect red-light cameras to pull us over, but we do expect they do something. It's not crazy to expect they also might have specific circumstances that flag to additional review for possible dispatch of an officer.
Red light cameras don’t do anything like this at all. The amount of false positives is far too high. There is a reason you get a ticket in the mail weeks later.
> If you see six objects and receive 5 signals, eliminate the ones you can, and send someone to investigate with directional equipment.
Drone flight times are usually under 20 min. Even in the future with battery technology, it’s unlikely someone is still going to be operating by the time you get someone out there with directional equipment. And now we have a to train a nationwide drone force capable of operating directional equipment.
>You make the sale of fake license plates illegal, you make sure the only valid plates are issued by the government, and you make it illegal to tamper with them.
None of these will dissuade a determined attacker. Just like license plates don’t stop terrorists. They aren’t designed to do that.
>Already covered a little above, but there's already solutions appearing to help with this. There's anti-drone ammunition[1] and trained animals[2] on the simple end, up to military grade anti-drone solutions.
So anytime a transponder malfunctions you want to shoot at a drone over a populated area? You want to want to add gun turrets to the cameras covering the country? Or do you want a nationwide system of trained attack birds stationed every mile or so?
You are massively underestimating the difficulty to accomplish what you are proposing.
The amount of explosives a drone can carry mean that for the foreseeable future they aren’t going to be particularly effective weapons for terrorists. Certainly not effective enough for us to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on a system that can be easily bypassed by flying below the tree line.
Regulating drones might prevent some accidents and nuisance complaints, but it isn't going to stop people from using them for terrorist attacks.
The point still stands. Automobile regulations weren't designed to make it harder for terrorist to use cars as intentional weapons. They do a very poor job at that, and if that were their intended purpose, they wouldn't be worth the cost.
Requiring licenses to operate drones may or may not be worth the cost. If it is, it won't be because it prevents terrorism.
When you start weasling your words, "dangerous enough to effectively be weapons" to be your premise, then you're going to lose the argument.
Drones are too easy to build and conceal to effectively prevent determined attackers from getting them and using them. Regulations are aimed at preventing accidents and nuisance incidents, not terrorism.
Explosives are also used in bombs, and those are heavily regulated.
If I think along those lines, the drone attacks are using drones as the delivery mechanism for the explosives, and whatever they are using for detonation mechanism is not interesting here. The explosives are regulated. So should the delivery mechanism be regulated? I think yes-- other delivery mechanisms for explosives to a target are guns, cannons, rockets... all regulated.
Can we effectively prevent bad actors from acquiring them without too much cost to everyone else? (plus how bad is it if bad actors acquire them) For some things the answer is yes : rockets, missiles etc... For others no: slingshots, skateboards, lawnmowers, scooters, remote control cars etc....
Drones are too easy to build to effectively prevent bad actors from acquiring them without a huge cost to society as a whole. Restricting all the components you'd need to prevent a terrorist from building their own drone is just too disruptive.
Less restrictive regulations like requiring licensing may be effective for other purposes, but not for preventing drone terrorism.
given that fireworks and powder are easily available (re: Tsarnaevs) or relative availability of ANFO (re: McVeigh) and similar stuff or that just one visit to Home Depot allows you to buy components making for a pretty good explosive, i think the explosives are regulated mostly to avoid them lying freely around under the kitchen sinks and in the garages and to avoid being handled by clueless people, not to protect from terrorists.
It also gets you a visit from the feds. Those sorts of purchases are tracked very closely since Mcveigh.
I bought acetone, hydrogen peroxide (in the form of a wood bleaching kit), and hydrochloric acid together in 2002 at a Home Depot and never got the slightest bit of attention.
I also bought an 80 pound sack of ammonium nitrate from a fertilizer dealer in 2002 with cash. I didn't show ID. The employees didn't grill me at all. I was pretty surprised, actually. I thought there would be some sort of tracking in place six years after the OKC bombing and 1 year after the 9/11 attacks. Maybe they only start tracking when you try to buy it by the tonne. Maybe my appearance (clean shaven white guy with glasses, no tattoos) gave me a pass where other sorts of buyers might need to show ID or explain why they're buying.
https://www.businessinsider.com/oklahoma-city-bombing-ammoni...
" the new legislation will require anyone buying more than 25 pounds to register, be screened against a known terrorist list, and require any thefts to be reported within 24 hours. "
Ditto for bulk sugar.
You can buy 2 way radios with zero purchase restrictions that will also work for the same purpose.
The 2013 shutdown of the BART network during protests shows that the government is at least as interested in suppressing protests are they are in stopping bombs from detonating.
Either way the ability for the government to shutdown cell towers is irrelevant. Cell phones themselves aren't "regulated like weapons". I don't need to pass a background check to buy one. I don't need to be licensed to own one. We don't require owners to prove they have a legitimate need to own them, and we don't require owners to lock them up and report thefts the way we do with explosives.
The reason we don't do these things is that the cost actually implementing all of that wouldn't be worth the benefit. You'd have to implement restrictions on anything with a radio, or anything that could be easily turned into a radio to have any meaningful impact on terrorism.
The same is true of drones. You'd need to tightly restrict so many electronic components to actually deter determined attackers that it's not worth it.
>The fact that the government doesn’t implement draconian restrictions reflects the balance inherent in all matters of public interest.
That's exactly what I said. Cost doesn't mean purely monetary when discussing cost benefit analyses.
>The reason we don't do these things is that the cost actually implementing all of that wouldn't be worth the benefit
As much as the need for a driving license is stopping them from using cars as weapons.
What a ridiculous statement. You can use this wording to justify the regulation of almost anything since almost anything can be used as a weapon if the user is determined enough.