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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."
but I don't come to slashdot for this. Is it because they use the word 'drone' instead of remote control helicopter that this becomes something for nerds?
bird shot fired from a shot gun - upwards - is harmless. It comes down softly. The only way to hurt someone is to shoot them directly and they would still need to be within a few meters. There are other types of shotgun ammunition that can do a lot more harm but the shot for dove, pigeon, etc. is very small and light.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
I am Not an Animal!
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
Animals do not have "rights", at least not in the sense humans do. A human has right to live. A pigeon does not have that right -- if one believes otherwise, one has to prevent pigeons from being killed by predators. The "animal rights" activists agree (I think; I have met a few of those) that it is OK animals to kill each other (which they do all the time anyway) and no "rights violation" happens when a hawk kills a pigeon. However, for some strange reason, animals rights are violated when people kill them -- at least, according to the "animal rights" activists. Go figure...
"law enforcement officers and an attorney claiming to represent the privately-owned plantation near Ehrhardt tried to stop the aircraft from flying.
"It didn't work; what SHARK was doing was perfectly legal," Hindi said in a news release. "Once they knew nothing was going to stop us, the shooting stopped and the cars lined up to leave."
TRIED. If launching the drone was against the law then do you not think that the law enforcement officers would have just arrested them as soon as they tried to launch? And shooting at something you don't like the look of because it's over your property is legal where you come from? I assume there are no civil flights, police helicopters, air ambulances, kites...
'Don't worry' said the trees when they saw the axe coming, 'The handle is one of us.'
What are you, 12? Over here in the adult world we're responsible for our own actions. There was no need for the hunters to shoot at the drone (it wasn't a danger to them they were just pissed off), so trying to blame the inherent riskiness of the hunters' actions on the operator of the drone is facile.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
WTF is a "live pigeon shoot"? Is there a dead pigeon shoot? The point of hunting is to kill something,so it is absurdly redundant. Pigeons are rats with wings and I assume that the species they are hunting there is not protected or endangered, so why not kill them? From what I have seen on TV and from real life, hunters are actually the most humane people when it comes to animals. Most of them take care to not make the animal suffer.
#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.
And if women didn't walk around dressed like sluts, they wouldn't get raped.
That's true, but how does this relate to the conversation?
Analogies are almost always a bad way to discuss, but I'm more disturbed by your "that's true" statement. This is the Burka argument, women should cover up or else men won't be able to control themselves from raping them. Not trying to insult your faith if you are a conservative muslim, but so disagree with this blame the victim approach.
It is also false to claim that you won't get raped if you cover up, look into real research and statistics on rape and you'll find that it is by far not a majority of the rape crimes that fall into this stereotype category. Most rape researches would tell you it is actually usually not driven by the sex, but the use of force, domination, humiliation, pent up anger, partly similar to other violent (and hate) crimes.
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.
(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.
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.
And if women didn't walk around dressed like sluts, they wouldn't get raped.
That's true, but how does this relate to the conversation?
There were women there walking around dressed like pigeons.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
http://thetandd.com/animal-rights-group-says-drone-shot-down/article_017a720a-56ce-11e1-afc4-001871e3ce6c.html
According to the article the drone was hovering over the U.S. 601 (a public road) when it was shot down. It was filming events on private property, but it was not out of bounds in itself .
That ought to address both your question and the snarky remark of the parent post.
I'm afraid this shows that those "hunters" with guns abused their privilege of toting rifles when they felt annoyed. It also illustrates the aggression these people display (as in: "they see something they don't like, so they shoot at it").
As a consequence I believe they cannot be trusted with firearms and therefore ought to lose that privilege (i.e. their gun license).
Generally speaking, you're not allowed to commit battery in defense of privacy alone. It would need to be trespass to justify that.
And you're certainly not allowed to use lethal force, much less destroy another person's chattels over public property.
Their gun permits should be revoked,...
What gun permits are you talking about? Is there any reason to believe that any of these people had concealed carry permits? These were not concealed carry weapons. South Carolina is one of those states that still believes in the Second Amendment. There is no permit necessary to own and/or carry a shotgun in South Carolina.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
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.
(2),(3) As noted by previous posts, the issue of flying that drone over a public road (something I definitely don't endorse; I fully agree with you there) is an issue between the authorities and those activists. Those hunters have no part in that.
All that they are entitled to do is report this incident to the sheriff (who was standing right next to those activists as it seems from the article) and complain of harassment and possible of endangering traffic by flying a drone over the road. After that it's up to the authorities to prosecute. Not those hunters.
(4) Those hunters shot at something that wasn't on or over the tract of land on which they were licensed to hunt on, and it wasn't the stuff they were licensed to hunt either.
And about the right to bear arms: that is not at issue here. People in the US do have the right to bear arms, but with that right comes responsibility. It cannot be otherwise. If you abuse your rights, then there are consequences. For example: forfeiting your rights.
I believe that someone who is so easily goaded into turning a gun from its legitimate purpose should not be allowed to carry it.
Context: Personally, I fully support regulated hunting for food, don't like hunting for trophy, and don't like the use of raised birds in a pigeon shoot (which seems to be the practice under scrutiny here).
After watching the video, I think there are two main issues - one (dealt with at length here) is about whether or not it was right and/or legal to shoot down the drone. The second one is whether or not it is right and/or legal for Hindi's group to be harassing the Broxton Bridge Plantation. His tone throughout and his words at the end of the video are clearly harassment - "we have a lot of plans for those people, that much I can guarantee."
If the shoot is legal, then the harassment should be illegal and the goal of Hindi's group should be to change the law through non violent protest and engaging the public (potentially with video).
If the shoot is illegal, then law enforcement should handle it. If they do not, the goal of Hindi's group should be to change the actions of law enforcement officials through non violent protest and engaging the public (potentially with video). The harassment should still be illegal.
I think this group has confused non violent protest against immoral laws with harassment of groups doing things you don't like.