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Hunters Shoot Down Drone of Animal Rights Group
Required Snark writes "A remote control drone operated by an animal rights group was shot down in South Carolina by a group of thwarted hunters. Steve Hindi, the group president said 'his group was preparing to launch its Mikrokopter drone to video what he called a live pigeon shoot on Sunday when law enforcement officers and an attorney claiming to represent the privately-owned plantation near Ehrhardt tried to stop the aircraft from flying.' After the shoot was halted, the drone was launched anyway, and at this point it was shot down. 'Seconds after it hit the air, numerous shots rang out,' Hindi said in the release. 'As an act of revenge for us shutting down the pigeon slaughter, they had shot down our copter.' 'It is important to note how dangerous this was, as they were shooting toward and into a well-travelled highway,' Hindi stated in the release."
There's video linked from the fine article. It looks a lot less dramatic than what the summary makes it sound to be. The road is not exactly a four lane interstate. It's single/double track and there's no traffic. The only vehicle you see is the animal rights group's parked van. Go see for yourselves.
Stefan Axelsson
They already have.
Not only that, animals don't have rights b'cos they can't make and keep agreements. For instance, in Africa, you don't have lions signing ceasefires w/ zebras and gazelles to not attack and eat them - they just attack anytime they feel like. And even vegetarian animals, such as deer, can be dangerous when around humans, even though they don't eat them. The only time anybody has rights is when they are capable of making agreements, and abiding by them, and when they don't, such rights get forfeited. You don't have that w/ animals - for instance, while the hawks in the above example don't respect the rights of pigeons, pigeons themselves don't respect the rights of worms, mongeese don't respect the rights of snakes and snakes don't respect the rights of frogs or rats. I agree that animals should be killed either for food/fur/leather or to contain the population (so that you don't have ones like mountain lions roaming around CA populated areas), not be merely hunted for sport, and also killed as painlessly as possible when killed for food. However, that's completely different from stating that they have rights of any kind.
PETA is currently trying to get the 13th amendment to be applied in the case of five killer whales held by SeaWorld.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-16920866
Yes, PETA is trying to get antislavery law to be applied against animals, which if successful will seriously change everything...
Given that the article says it crashed onto the highway, and helicopters aren't known for gliding, I'd say they were on top of the highway.
#6 Birdshot fired out of a 12 gauge has a maximum effective range of around 40 yards, when shooting birds. I can guarantee there was no danger posed to anyone on that highway, the birdshot never even got close.
My guess is that in addition to being anti-hunting, they are also anti-gun (those two often go together). Well something else you discover is that often the anti-gun crowd is very, very uneducated about guns. Rather than learn all about them so as to have more solid arguments, they are scared by them and thus know little to nothing about them.
So it doesn't surprise me at all they they would believe that any gun fired in any direction is a major hazard. Plus I'm sure they are bitching as loud as possible to get attention (and it seems to be working).
For those wondering, the parent is correct: birdshot will fall to the ground harmlessly. Birdshot is composed of hundreds of tiny, tiny pellets, 2mm or so. Thus they lose kinetic energy rapidly in the air, and don't hit very hard when they fall. It is specifically designed to be shot in the air and not have to worry about where it falls. Rather important for bird hunting.
Even buckshot isn't all that dangerous falling back to ground. While larger and heavier, it is also just round lead balls and thus cannot maintain a ballistic trajectory and just falls back to the ground.
Rifle bullets are the ones that are most dangerous, though pistol rounds can be as well. Since they are spin stabilized they can maintain a ballistic trajectory for long distances, miles even. As such they can potentially hit with lethal force even if fired at a pretty steep angle.
Usually when people shoot in any sort of practice or competition, it is with clay pigeons. They are just little clay discs that fly pretty well, and shatter very nicely when hit with a shotgun blast. For a live pigeon shoot one would assume they would be using real pigeons.
A human has right to live
The US president disagrees. After implementing NDAA, it is legal for anyone to be killed anywhere in the world without due process.
(unexciting) Youtube video of the shootdown can be found on the SHARK youtube channel.
Doesn't look like they were trespassing.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Most rape "researches" are incompetent work paid for by people who want some made up statistics to power their agenda. In reality, less than 5% of reported rapes [in the USA] are stranger rape, the kind that "sexy clothing" refers to. Considering that, in the case of stranger rape, "sexy clothing" is actually one of the biggest motivators (along with blackout drunk whores and walking down dark alleys), and very relevant to target in bringing stranger rapes down - by not dressing and, especially, acting like a retarded whore while out at night.
All of the retarded bullshit that you bring up at the end of your post (the crap that was written about in order to back agendas, and has been shot down by real research multiple times) has to do with the massive majority of rapes - those perpetrated by family members, significant others, friends or acquaintances. Also, the rise of false rape claims by women has been inflating their statistics because those false claims get counted along with the rest - it's better for business to do it that way.
You may or may not have been informing people of the same things that I just mentioned, I really can't tell from your horrible use of the language.
you are wrong as nobody would be able to fly private aircraft and hot air balloons.
And yes I know this, I was a private pilot. I'm not tresspassing until I am below the tree line.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Hindi and his crew were lucky. They should have been arrested. South Carolina has a hunter harassment law.
50-1-137: It is unlawful for a person wilfully to impede or obstruct another person from lawfully hunting, trapping, fishing, or harvesting marine species. Any person violating the provisions of this section is guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction, must be punished as provided by Section 50-1-130. In addition to the criminal penalty, any person convicted must have his privilege to hunt, trap, fish, or harvest marine species recreationally or commercially revoked for one year.
50-1-130: Unless a different penalty is specified, any person who violates a provision of this title is guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction, must be fined not less than twenty-five dollars nor more than two hundred dollars or imprisoned for not less than ten days nor more than thirty days.
A human has right to live.
Which is why 58 countries have capital punishment and we have been hearing a lot lately about countries from a certain corner of the world respecting the shit out of this right to live. Oh, I am sorry, what was your point again?
The majority of animal rights activists do not want to abolish the eating of animals. They just want to see them treated as humanely as possible: No unnecessary pain, no killing for fun or sport (as in TFA), no medical experiments, acceptable living conditions. Is that so wrong? Do living creatures who are proven to be capable of feeling pain and distress not have a right to be treated fairly?
Rudolf Hess edited Mein Kampf. He was the very first grammar nazi.
However, for some strange reason, animals rights are violated when people kill them -- at least, according to the "animal rights" activists.
I can't speak for all animal rights activists, but I think they're less concerned with the killing than the suffering. Few activists protest against hunts that're necessary to keep the population in check (because the animals would just starve to death when their numbers became too high). One of the most reviled types of hunts are fox hunts, presumably because they're prolonged and stressful to the animal, and done purely for entertainment.
The hunters were legally hunting on private property. The retard brought his drone to break the law by interfering with lawful hunting, then got his toy shot down:
http://idle.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2682739&cid=39108527
http://idle.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2682739&cid=39108897
On my property, I expect a right to privacy. If my property and privacy is invaded after I deny permission, then your flying camera is merely a "peeping tom tool" at this point.
Expect your little toy to be damaged...and...don't EVEN try to equate it with a piloted commercial aircraft with human lives on board. The attempt just illustrates the weakness of your logic.
That's just plane wrong. (pun intended)
You have no reasonable expectation of privacy from overflying aircraft. Florida v. Riley, IIRC, was the name of the SCOTUS case that established that. YMMV, and consult an attorney for applicable state law. (State constitutions or other law may grant you different rights, although that likely gets tricky in a federally regulated area like aviation.)
-- IANAL, this isn't legal advice, and definitely isn't legal advice for you. Also, Squee!
Kinda depends. So if you fire the bullets at a steep enough angle, they'll lose their ballistic trajectory and tumble back to Earth. In that case they don't go very fast and while the might hurt if they clocked you in the head, they won't cause any real injury. Also out in the middle of nowhere there is a lot of unoccupied desert so even if the bullets do fly far, they probably don't hit anything.
None of that is to say it is a good idea or anything, but I doubt it is all that common for people to get injured or killed by it.
Given that the article says it crashed onto the highway, and helicopters aren't known for gliding, I'd say they were on top of the highway.
Their video shows the drone flying away from the highway, then returning towards the highway presumably after it was shot at; around 2:15 in the video, it looks like it took some damage to one of the rotors, so it was perhaps damaged enough to no longer maintain altitude, but not enough to prevent them bringing it back under some control.
If they where pigeon hunting (which is a legal pastime in many areas) they where likely using a 12 gauge shotgun with #8 birdshot, which has an effective range (deadly) of about 50 yards, even with a very tight choke on the shotgun might get a range of MAYBE 100 yards. I'm suspecting the "drone" was damaged and didn't just fall from the sky, but had a controlled landing. Might have been a few people around with handguns, but that's a pretty impressive shot beyond 50 yards. Either way, I don't really have a problem with them shooting it down, they where invading their privacy while doing something completely legal.
A lot of the deaths occur from the bullet entering your shoulder and hitting your heart. Penetrating your shoulder requires a lot less velocity than your head. This paper "Can a Falling Bullet Be Lethal at Terminal Velocity? Cardiac Injury Caused by a Celebratory Bullet" seems to suggest that you can indeed be killed by falling bullets.
S.C. Code Ann. 16-17-470. Eavesdropping, peeping, voyeurism. (2001)
(A) It is unlawful for a person to be an eavesdropper or a peeping tom on or about the premises of another or to go upon the premises of another for the purpose of becoming an eavesdropper or a peeping tom. The term "peeping tom", as used in this section, is defined as a person who peeps through windows, doors, or other like places, on or about the premises of another, for the purpose of spying upon or invading the privacy of the persons spied upon and any other conduct of a similar nature, that tends to invade the privacy of others. The term "peeping tom" also includes any person who employs the use of video or audio equipment for the purposes set forth in this section. A person who violates the provisions of this section is guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction, must be fined not more than five hundred dollars or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
(B) A person commits the crime of voyeurism if, for the purpose of arousing or gratifying sexual desire of any person, he or she knowingly views, photographs, audio records, video records, produces, or creates a digital electronic file, or films another person, without that person's knowledge and consent, while the person is in a place where he or she would have a reasonable expectation of privacy. A person who violates the provisions of this subsection:
(1) for a first offense, is guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction, must be fined not more than five hundred dollars or imprisoned not more than three years, or both; or
(2) for a second or subsequent offense, is guilty of a felony and, upon conviction, must be fined not less than five hundred dollars or more than five thousand dollars or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
(C) A person commits the crime of aggravated voyeurism if he or she knowingly sells or distributes any photograph, audio recording, video recording, digital electronic file, or film of another person taken or made in violation of this section. A person who violates the provisions of this subsection is guilty of a felony and, upon conviction, must be fined not less than five hundred dollars or more than five thousand dollars or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
They didn't commit battery.
Webster's Unabridged:
"Law. an unlawful attack upon another person by beating or wounding, or by touching in an offensive manner."
Is releasing drugged game from boxes and then shooting them at close range really illegal?
FTFY