One thing the drones really need to do before being deployed en masse (besides safety) is to become relatively silent. They are quite loud. I can hear a single one from about 1/2 mile away. I can't imagine what it will be like if many are flying all over, at all times. It will be like everybody is living next to an airport - something I consciously choose to not live close to due to noise pollution. Quality of life will go down, and people will become very annoyed. I own 2 drones. They are very loud and there isn't much you can do to quiet them. They are helicopters with 4x the number of blades on very tiny motors that spin very fast and are loud.
U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
41–50 of 202 posts
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#42Lots of safety concerns are brought up, but I'm really curious how drones will play out in conjunction with noise and NIMBYism. Drones are loud, so I can't imagine that commercial drone activity (Especially at night) will happen without heavy pushback from locals. NASA did a study and found that the noise drones make is perceived to be more annoying than those from cars [1]. They acknowledge noise-based pushback as a…
You can barely hear (or even see) a small drone above about 100m.
multiply that by many, many drones. Those "small" drones aren't what they will use for delivery services. They are not nearly powerful enough to carry more of a load much more than it's own weight. They are even louder taking off and landing. I own 2.
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#43Will they have restrictions on the cargo that these drones are allowed to carry. I know that the drones themselves will probably have rechargeable batteries powering them. However, if
1. the drone is carrying cargo
2. the cargo isn't sufficiently secure to the drone
3. the cargo contains rechargeable batteries / some other component that can explode as result of high speed impact with a sufficiently hard surface
4. the cargo lacks sufficient packaging material
5. the cargo happens to fall from the drone's flight altitude
then isn't there a risk of an explosion?
Update: Is this question inappropriate? I made it in good faith.
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#44Good. The US government has been restricting commercial operations of drone development for far too long. Many companies that were US-based are moving their operations overseas where the laws are more reasonable (Australia and New Zealand, for example). This is a simple and reasonable step in the right direction. Open up legal operations for the smallest category and begin collecting data. It can help pave the way to…
I'm more than happy to wait to see how those citizens in other countries like the noise, before doing it here.
The privacy issues will also be interesting. Do you think these companies won't be attaching cameras to them as well to capture as much data as they possibly can why flying around? Then multiply that times as many drones as will be flying around. It will be great for tracking too, since you can theoretically have almost have 24/7 coverage, especially cities where everything is more compact. Just patch all the feeds together, like they do with cell phone cameras in Argus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13BahrdkMU8
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#45Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can barely hear (or even see) a small drone above about 100m.
multiply that by many, many drones. Those "small" drones aren't what they will use for delivery services. They are not nearly powerful enough to carry more of a load much more than it's own weight. They are even louder taking off and landing. I own 2.
Larger drones tend to be more quiet, or at the very least are perceived to be so due to the lower pitch sound made by larger, more slowly rotating propellers.
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
Since this is about objects falling from a certain height, yes, weight is a useful metric for rough safety estimates. A bullet does damage because it holds a lot more energy from being accelerated - a 9mm bullet will go around a mile up before falling down (source: MythBusters). Two 500g boxes dropped from a likely much lower height will have a similar effect (concussion?) when dropped on a pedestrian regardless of t…
The bullet, falling from the same height as a crashing drone, is at least as lethal if it strikes a human. There is no "safe weight" for a falling object... but there may be a "safe momentum".
The proposed flying zone for drones like these is between 60-120m height. Seems like a bullet must travel at least 62m/s to penetrate human skin [1], for which you need a height of at least ~200m [2]. So even dropping a bullet from one the delivery drones would not carry a high risk of fatal injuries.
That, and P=MV, momentum/energy increases proportionally to mass. A 'safe weight' can be defined if the altitude is known.
[1] https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2011/03/can-falling-bull...
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
They are loud for now. That will change.
Fans, helicopters etc have been around for decades and are still mostly loud. You can't escape the physics that moving air causes noise.
Energy efficient buildings tend to handle noise pollution better with their extra insulation. Not ideal, but there's always a solution.
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#49What if someone wanted to operate drones containing scientific instruments over industrial sites? Several years back, the PLOS folks visited my local hackerspace and talked about using balloons to double check chemical emissions of oil refineries near Houston. They had to use balloons, because there were legal problems with using drones. The concerns of overflown companies are quite understandable as well. For things like scientific instruments, what about some sort of inspection of flown equipment and licensing?
Re: U.S. proposes to allow drone operation at night, over people
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
multiply that by many, many drones. Those "small" drones aren't what they will use for delivery services. They are not nearly powerful enough to carry more of a load much more than it's own weight. They are even louder taking off and landing. I own 2.
Larger drones tend to be more quiet, or at the very least are perceived to be so due to the lower pitch sound made by larger, more slowly rotating propellers.
Helicopters have lower pitch and larger, slower rotating blades as well. They're not quiet, and they've had a lot longer to perfect the blade tech. My block gets about 15 deliveries per day from UPS/USPS/FedEx/Amazon/etc. Have you been near a drone, of any size, taking off and landing? It's quite loud. They're not just going to drop the package from the sky. They're going to be constantly landing and taking off to deliver the package, right near you.