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Comment by ghaff | Hacker News Reader

And you're

1.) competing against the economics of standard delivery vehicles

2.) Ref: law/liability. At scale you're possibly violating airspace of people's property and, while I don't expect people in non-rural areas to start using them for skeet practice in general, I would expect lots of complaints to the government if they become annoying.

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> you're possibly violating airspace of people's property

There is no such thing in the United States. All airspace is under federal jurisdiction, and the only agency with rule making authority is the FAA.

Clearly people have some rights to the space over their property. Case law isn't well established but, outside of airport landing rights, the consensus seems to be something like 400 feet which is in general uncontrolled airspace.

https://aerocorner.com/blog/drone-over-private-property/

I probably won't shoot down a delivery drone though I may file a complaint. But if a drone starts poking around at low altitude over my property, it will definitely be skeet shooting practice time (on a rural property).

Anyone that starts taking potshots at drones over their property is risking federal charges for shooting at an aircraft.

I thought (more relevantly) there were also laws about shooting without a backdrop to catch stray bullets, since this sounds like a densely populated area, also perhaps shooting towards people: bullets that go up, come down again somewhere else at nearly the same speed.

No, they come down at their terminal velocity, which is far slower. Could give you a bump on the head, though.

They can still kill you.

https://blogs.bcm.edu/2019/12/31/what-goes-up-must-come-down...

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5912041/

Do you claim to be able to understand the second link? Here is a sentence from that paper: “The mortality rate from falling bullets in general is about 32% that is significantly higher than nonfalling bullets 2%–6% although the latter's impact is much more potential to kill.”

I read the first one too. The problem with these anecdotes is that none of them rule out that the injuries were caused by a bullet on a shallow trajectory, with velocity much greater than terminal velocity. The only evidence is that no one heard a shot, but this is not convincing.

Nevertheless, there is a potential for serious injury and nobody should be shooting into the air for fun.

If they go straight up they come down at terminal velocity, but if they go up on a shallower angle they maintain a lot of speed. Mythbusters: https://mythresults.com/episode50

Property rights in the US are particularly funny. You don’t own as much as you think you do. The land deed you have is a 2D plot of land. There are also mineral rights, air rights, and raparian rights. That last one is the rights to collect water in your land. Most likely there is a water management authority who owns the rain water in your property. Unless your deed specifically states you own mineral rights a mining company can dig or drill right under your land.

You don't own anything if the government can confiscate it for failing to make indefinite recurrent payments on it.

As long as you pay property tax your property is really owned by Uncle Sam.

There are parts of the country where you can buy unincorporated land. But most people don't want to live there. You are responsible for building and maintaining your own roads, pumping your own water and treat sewage. Police, fire, and public schools are a monthly fee. And if you don't pay and change your mind it's a retroactive charge.

It's the kind of living only the most dedicated can afford to do. Everyone else simply pays city/county taxes and assume the problem is going to get sorted.

I think this may depend on jurisdiction.

I was told that I own my land and everything up to “the sky”. Granted, for practical purposes this means that if a neighbors tree over hangs my plat I have the right to trim it up across my property line.

Any legal beagles able to chime in?

For the US, there's no such thing as private property rights to airspace, and all the laws controlling airspace are exclusively federal. There can be temporary and permanent flight restrictions for events or protected areas, and there are restrictions about flying too close to buildings when operating manned aircraft that don't apply to drones (the opposite, in fact, you can fly at higher altitudes if you are close to a building). Now you can get busted for flying in an unsafe manner, harassment, or any number of privacy violations, but not trespassing.

To make matters confusing, there are "air rights," but those have to do with zoning and how tall a building can be made. Nothing to do with flying.

In every jurisdiction I’m aware of minerals run with the land absent specific conveyance/reservation severing the estate.

Contemplating buying some of these-

https://www.budk.com/12-Gauge-Skynet-Drone-Defense--3-Pack-3...

The article at your link is very old, and almost none of it is still correct today.

> Clearly people have some rights to the space over their property.

According to the federal government, they do not.

> Case law isn't well established but, outside of airport landing rights, the consensus seems to be something like 400 feet which is in general uncontrolled airspace

Incidentally, 400’ is the maximum height a UAS may fly under 14 USC 107 without special authorization.

> But if a drone starts poking around at low altitude over my property, it will definitely be skeet shooting practice time (on a rural property)

As “drones” are considered aircraft under federal law, shooting at them is a federal crime:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/johngoglia/2016/04/13/faa-confi...

Drones are going to force changes to those rules, if they haven't already.

This hasn’t really been well tested in court. If I hover a drone for 20 minutes at 6 inch altitude in your front lawn in front of your toddler and you blow it to smithereens with a 12 gauge you’re not likely to be prosecuted for it.

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