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FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

reuters.com

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Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#261

Post by enriquec »

bananabreakfast wrote: post #218
enriquec wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

then why were seatbelts and safety glass delivered by the free market? why are tesla's significantly safer than other manufacturers of their own free will? Why do they push updates that improve braking to customers that have already paid? Why does volvo specifically advertise their safety as a differentiator? Do you really think if a company could prove it provides double the survivability of accidents compared to ot…

You're actually proving yourself wrong here. Regulation and regulation alone provided us with seatbelts and safety glass. Car companies even ran a massive lobbying and advertising campaign to convince America seatbelts weren't necessary with slogans calling drivers in car accidents "the nut behind the wheel" https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/nut-behind-wheel/

No, Volvo gave us seatbelts and the Tucker gave us safety glass. 9 years after the free market created seatbelts, the government mandated it. Mandates have never and will never manifest technological/scientific advancements out of nowhere.

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#262

Post by Triv888 »

noizejoy wrote: post #235
Triv888 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because the Gov. only likes to combine laws when it suits them... i.e.: corona virus stimulus package and felony for streaming

And (some) HN commenters only like to combine issues when it suits them :-)

guilty

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#263

Post by phkahler »

clamprecht wrote: post #180
snuxoll wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With the proliferation of drones the entire ADS-B system would get overwhelmed, which is why the rules explicitly state that uSAS' are NOT allowed to transmit on ADS-B. Not to mention ADS-B OUT is expensive as all hell, power hungry and heavy - not a good match for lightweight unmanned craft.

I hear ya... maybe ADS-B isn't the solution here, but I wish pilots could somehow see drones on the traffic screen.

It should be enough to maintain minimums while the drones obey their maximums and stay away from airports. But that doesnt cover everything and it would be nice optionally show them.

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#264

Post by phkahler »

mike_d wrote: post #103
phkahler wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Magnetron and a wok for a dish. Kitchen counter measures.

Be careful there tough guy, drones receive the same protections as aircraft. A threat against one is punishable under 18 U.S. Code § 32. "Whoever willfully imparts or conveys any threat [against an aircraft] shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than five years, or both."

Oh wow! Well I'd still do it to the one peeping in the daughter's bedroom, unless I could get its ID and track down the pervert first.

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#265

Post by chokeartist »

pc86 wrote: post #21
lumost wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's likely that the energy cost of drone delivery is a small fraction of the cost a human delivery driver incurs walking to a stoop, particularly if one considers the not insignificant injury risk. flight is appealing over ground based drones as one delivery truck or base station could concurrently service multiple blocks with lower risk of someone abducting or damaging the drone. Although in all honesty I'm not sur…

You're naive if you think a company is going to take on increases costs via drone-based deliveries to marginally decrease delivery driver injury risk.

Agreed that will never be the sole motivation. But faster delivery times is something that people will most definitely consider - I know I would.

Want that ice cream in 2 hours? $3 delivery via car. Want that ice cream in 15 minutes? $10 delivery via drone.

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#266

Post by zionic »

megablast wrote: post #212
sokoloff wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m a little surprised to see a “if you have nothing to fear, you have nothing to hide” stance for private transport. What is the argument why their vehicles should be trackable?

Every vehicle should be tracked, especially cars that are responsible for so much injury and death.

By chance, do you work for google/Facebook?

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#267

Post by Sodman »

throwawaysea wrote: post #176
Sodman wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As long as there are no rules against a Harley Davidson which can be heard by anyone within a mile radius cruising down the street at 10pm (same goes for loud muscle cars, trucks etc), it seems like we shouldn't go arbitrarily restricting drone noise. With regards to cameras in public places, I'd be far more worried about somebody hiding in the bushes quietly with a DSLR that nobody knows about. At least with a drone…

I disagree. A drone can be used to harass them with its presence in an anonymous manner. It can also more easily follow someone around, as opposed to someone in the bushes. A DSLR with a long lens doesn’t have that mobility, is considerably more expensive, and stabilizing video at very long distance is hard. I’m also not sure what bearing a Harley has on this situation - we can reason about this without bringing moto…

I've never once seen a drone and not been able to pin-point its operator within 30 seconds. Usually you hear the whirr of the drone and look around, there'll be somebody standing nearby with a massively conspicuous radio controller.

It's already illegal to fly drones outside of line-of-sight of the operator, and once they start getting big enough (>250g) to allow a longer flight time, the operator is also required to have a spotter, a license and register the drone with the government (USA). The new rules mentioned in the article also directly try to address this with remote ID - the idea is that it's a "digital license plate" which must be openly broadcast from all drones > 250g. So if you see a drone doing something illegal (eg no operator within line of sight), it should be trivial to report it and for the operator to face consequences.

My point about Harleys was that of precedence - we already live in a very noisy world where it's perfectly acceptable to buy/modify incredibly loud machines (louder than drones by a lot) for primarily entertainment purposes, to be used in public or residential areas. My leaf blower literally makes more noise than my drone and usually runs for 10x as long, to say nothing of a multi-stage gas-powered snowblower. My point here is that things are loud, and drones aren't even close to the loudest things we already find totally acceptable, so it feels arbitrary to ban them over noise concerns. For what it's worth, I'm totally on board with restricting night-flying for noise reasons, I just don't think we need additional laws beyond existing noise ordinance for daytime flying.

Finally, if you're feeling very paranoid about this from a camera/anonymity perspective today (TFA says the new rules have ~30 months before coming into effect), most drones broadcast their video feed on analog channels, so you can buy a $10 receiver that'll plug into any modern smartphone and you can see exactly what the drone sees. That should lead you back to the operator if necessary (bonus points if you record your screen for evidence of any wrongdoing).

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#268

Post by nswest23 »

enriquec wrote: post #261
bananabreakfast wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're actually proving yourself wrong here. Regulation and regulation alone provided us with seatbelts and safety glass. Car companies even ran a massive lobbying and advertising campaign to convince America seatbelts weren't necessary with slogans calling drivers in car accidents "the nut behind the wheel" https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/nut-behind-wheel/

No, Volvo gave us seatbelts and the Tucker gave us safety glass. 9 years after the free market created seatbelts, the government mandated it. Mandates have never and will never manifest technological/scientific advancements out of nowhere.

> Mandates have never and will never manifest technological/scientific advancements out of nowhere.

I don't think that anyone is arguing that. I think the point is that the free market doesn't deliver these kind of safety features w/o the "incentive" of government mandates. Whether that is b/c the market doesn't demand those safety features in the absence of a mandate is another issue.

Re: FAA issuing new rules to allow drones to fly over people and at night

#269

Post by dheera »

labawi wrote: post #257
dheera wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am always stunned that many (most/all) of these high tech gadgets lack a LOT of safety features. Exactly. I would also expect a drone to have triple redundundancy of all sensors but they seem to have only one copy of each.

As long as they are carrying less people than 737-MAX, I think they will be fine with less redundancy. They should be safe, so they don't fall on people etc, but that is a separate issue.

All it takes is for a single IMU failure to fall on people. Two IMUs doesn't help because you don't know which one is right. With three you can vote out the 1/3 failing IMU and issue a warning to land immediately.

Same for GPS and everything else.

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