Ask Slashdot: Time To Regulate Domestic Drones? 190
Nerval's Lobster writes "Earlier this week, a small helicopter drone tumbled out of the sky over midtown Manhattan, crashing to the sidewalk near Grand Central Station. On the way down it almost hit a businessman, who plucked out the video card from the wreckage and handed it over to a local television-news station. In the video, the drone (a Phantom Quadcopter) lifts off from what looks like an apartment terrace and buzzes its merry way toward some nearby skyscrapers, pausing for a few panoramic surveys of the Manhattan skyline. But the operator is clearly inexperienced, crashing the vehicle against the side of a building, and the flight lasts a mere three minutes before a final collision sends it to the street. Drone enthusiasts and engineers blamed the Quadcopter's poor performance on the pilot's possible reliance on GPS mode; when flying in an area crowded with tall buildings (and they don't get much taller or more crowded than in Manhattan) that block GPS signals, a vehicle can quickly think it's off-target and attempt to correct, leading to crashes. In theory, the FAA forbids the operation of unmanned aerial vehicles over crowded areas such as Manhattan, but that hasn't stopped any number of hobbyists from launching drones. And hobbyists aside, the industry for commercial drones is picking up: over the summer, the FAA approved a pair of small, unmanned aircraft systems for flight, and Airware (which builds autopilot computers for drones) recently accepted funding from Google Ventures. That's led legislators to begin exploring ways to regulate domestic drone use (particularly with regard to use by law enforcement), and it begs the question: should drones be regulated? And if so, how?"
A similar incident just happened in Australia, where a small drone operated by an unknown owner crashed into the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Counter-terrorism officials felt they had to investigate, of course.
Double regulation? (Score:5, Insightful)
The article states the FAA already has regulations, so WHY the call for more? Just enforce what is there and stop making it harder to actually follow laws and regulations.
Drones? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's no drone... (Score:4, Insightful)
/ force
It's a frickin' toy. And what's up with taking the SD card and giving it away? If a car crashes in front of him will he start picking up items and handing them out?
stop making stupid laws (Score:5, Insightful)
How is this different from any other model aircraft? Quadcopters are probably a lot less dangerous than all the other kinds of model aircraft people have been flying for decades.
It's simple: if you hurt or kill someone with a "drone", you're going to be held responsible just when you do the same with any other kind of object, vehicle, weapon, or model aircraft. And if you fly model aircraft where you shouldn't, you can be held responsible for that already.
Now, stop making new stupid laws that simply duplicate already existing, perfectly good laws.
Re:Could have killed someone (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, a 3 pound object like a flower pot, a window pane, a coke bottle, a chunk of rock, a purse, a model airplane, or any of many other kinds of objects that tumble off buildings. Are you going to make new, separate laws for each class of object? Why???
Re:"Domestic"? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm pretty sure if it's a good idea to have regulations on drones in one single country in the world, they're a good idea everywhere.
We already have regulations. It says so right in the summary: the FAA forbids the operation of unmanned aerial vehicles over crowded areas such as Manhattan. That fact that operators are violating existing regulations is in no way evidence that we need more regulations (that will presumably also be violated).
This is just an attempted power grab by authoritarians. They want government drones to spy on us, but they don't the people to be able to look back at them.