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Aerial Video Footage of New York Taken By RC Plane
kkleiner writes with this fun bit from Singularity Hub: "Expert remote control pilot Raphael 'Trappy' Pirker recently took his 54 inch Zephyr model plane on a harrowing tour of Manhattan and the surrounding area. The best part: his RC vehicle was fitted with a camera that wirelessly transmitted an amazing recording of everything it saw – Pirker was piloting his craft with this visual feed. As you can see in the video, the results were spectacular. The plane looks to be flying within a few feet of buildings and whizzing past bridges with ease. You have to check out around 2:01 when he starts to buzz right by the Statute of Liberty."
This was on Ars Technica awhile back:
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/12/how-a-rc-airplane-buzzed-the-statue-of-liberty-with-no-arrests.ars
According to this earlier article, the police and TSA talked to him, but surprisingly didn't charge him with anything. He said they were "more curious than confrontational."
He notified authorities and had their permission. In fact, I believe they were on site during the fly.
He notified authorities and had their permission. In fact, I believe they were on site during the fly.
I am wrong about that. Apparently he did not inform the authorities before hand, but they did show up while he was flying, which is why there is some video of authorities on site when the plane landed, leading to my confusion.
It seems they were alright with everything, apparently no laws were broken.
Maximum tested range is 27 miles. Maximum estimated range by their calculations is 120 miles.
If you've ever looked at, and held an RC airplane of that size (54 inch wingspan), in person, you would quickly come to realize that it's a toy and of no danger to society. As have apparently the DHS and NYPD guys.
They are made of balsa wood and foam. They are very light. They have a useful payload of about a pound. Yes a 1-pound bomb can cause damage, but really it would just be so much easier for a terrorist to throw a hand grenade or something, rather than go through all of this shenanigan.
Just off the top of my head, having built and flown a lot of RC craft in the past, a 54" plane could have a flight time of an hour at 80mph, so he could easily reach his 27 mile radio range and back, with time to maneuver in between.
Umm, a 10 sec google search of some NYC RC hobby message boards tells me that flying RC planes in NYC is actually illegal, as in most cities, except in some specific designated areas. Nothing to do with fear of terrorists, and everything to do with crashing into people, breaking windows, causing car accidents and such.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
The "Advisory Circular" mentioned briefly in the interview video is FAA AC 91-57, "Model Aircraft Operating Standards". You can download a copy of it from http://tinyurl.com/28wko9o . As the "A" in the name implies, ACs are advisory in nature. They do not carry the force of law, but generally if you can show that you've complied with an AC, the FAA is happy.
It's pretty clear, however, that he didn't comply with several points of the AC. The Verrazano bridge towers are 690 feet tall, and clearly he was above that, so he obviously didn't stay below 400 feet. The reason for the 400 foot limit is because "real" planes are supposed to stay above 500 feet, per 14 CFR 91.119(c). If you stay below 400 and they stay above 500, nobody swaps paint.
Given the areas and altitudes he flew in, it's unlikely he caused any hazard to jet traffic flying in or out of the three big NYC airports, but there's a lot of low-level seaplane (East River below the 59th street bridge), and helicopter traffic (numerous busy heliports all over the place) in and out of there. A plane like this is essentially invisible to the pilots of those aircraft. "Big sky, small plane" works in your favor here, even more so than usual.
It looks to me like he stayed mostly over water, so I'd guess the hazard to people on the ground was minimal. Although, I don't know what would happen if he had lost radio control. Do these things have some kind of dead man switch which cuts power to the prop if radio signal is lost? If so, then it's hard to imagine doing any kind of major damage.