The War Zone has some better reporting on this incident.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/42021/radio-transmissi...
Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
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Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#22Somewhat off topic, what I find curious is that gangs have not yet started really making use of drones. I've heard of them being used to drop drugs and phones into prisons, but not much else. Some of the higher end hobby drones can fly just as high as general aviation aircraft and really fast and carry a lot of weight. Or perhaps I have missed the stories?
All the "drone delivery" startups and big co projects have outright failed or been nothing more than PR. There might be something about this that is a lot more difficult than can be seen prima facie, starting probably with the flight time of battery powered drones..
The biggest barriers are the law and liability. There is a lot of red tape, and rightfully so. Flying heavy items over residential areas comes with a lot of risk, risk that someone doing so illegally, with an untraceable aircraft, likely would not care about.
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#23My guess would be a semi-autonomous military vehicle was being tested in the most real-world scenario possible. As others have said it likely had liquid fuel rather than battery reserves which would allow such operation.
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#24Somewhat off topic, what I find curious is that gangs have not yet started really making use of drones. I've heard of them being used to drop drugs and phones into prisons, but not much else. Some of the higher end hobby drones can fly just as high as general aviation aircraft and really fast and carry a lot of weight. Or perhaps I have missed the stories?
I think it might have been on the show, Drugs Inc. that I heard this -a gang member explaining how they'd use a drone with thermal over residential college areas, where students would often grow pot; then they'd knock on the door and either take it all, or conscripted them into growing for the gang.
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#25...and what would they do if they caught up with it?
Wait until it runs out of fuel and then retrieve it?
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
All the "drone delivery" startups and big co projects have outright failed or been nothing more than PR. There might be something about this that is a lot more difficult than can be seen prima facie, starting probably with the flight time of battery powered drones..
The biggest barriers are the law and liability. There is a lot of red tape, and rightfully so. Flying heavy items over residential areas comes with a lot of risk, risk that someone doing so illegally, with an untraceable aircraft, likely would not care about.
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.
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narco-submarine >The number of narcosubs—boats modified to minimize their profile while shuttling drugs, has exploded nearly tenfold in the past decade. https://www.yahoo.com/news/why-seas-suddenly-swimming-drug-2...
Those are crewed, or occasionally towed behind a normal boat. It should be relatively straightforward at this point to build a sub that can navigate entirely by itself.
GPS doesn’t work underwater. Almost all the drone tech navigates by GPS; converting over to an inertial nav system and making that reliable for autonomous underwater operation is a good bit more than “relatively straightforward” I think.
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#28With 70+ minutes of flight time, maybe it wasn't battery powered but rather powered with liquid fuel.
The most likely explanation is that the chase never actually happened, and the police are making it up. We should be long past the point of uncritically believing everything police claim.
There were two helicopters involved, border patrol and tucson police. They also phoned into the FAA as it was going down.
They also made visual contact with the light on the underside of the drone: "From what I can tell just from its position light, you know, I would have to imagine it was larger than a quadcopter"
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#29Article says it had to be satellite driven but why not AI powered?
it apparently behaved more erratically as it got away from its original position. Of course doesn't exclude that it's autonomous but makes it more likely that it was remote controlled
Re: Police helicopter's 100mph chase with 'super sophisticated' drone near Tucson
#30My guess would be a semi-autonomous military vehicle was being tested in the most real-world scenario possible. As others have said it likely had liquid fuel rather than battery reserves which would allow such operation.
Nah, probably just Jupiter and a a confused pilot