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Activists' Drone Shot Out of the Sky For Fourth Time
garymortimer writes "Photos provided by the animal rights group show the multicopter smoking on the ground, with its lithium polymer battery supply smoldering. Another photo shows the drone's video camera smashed. The drone, dubbed 'Angel,' was a Cinestar 8 octocopter estimated at $4,000. This wasn't the first time SHARK has been shot out of the sky. This is the fourth drone that the group has lost while investigating pigeon shootings. One drone landed on club property, and is the subject of an ongoing lawsuit."
If you fly a drone over my land, ill shoot it down too. Its an invasion of my privacy and borderline trespassing.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Let's see here... an animal rights group flying a camera drone over private property full of gun-loving people they happen to have pissed off... yeah, um, how else would that turn out?
Need I remind the tree-huggers that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results? Or maybe they're getting the exact result they really want - lots of publicity for the low, low price of $4000 a pop.
They're using drones to investigate people that are good at shooting things that are flying in the air - seriously?
If you eat the animals...that's a pretty damn good reason for killing it.
When was the last time you ate a live animal?
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
This group sneaking cameras into others' private property should be arrested for being peeping Toms.
From reading TFA I don't know what they're complaining about - they were able to make a nuisance of themsleves over private property for most of the day. That it took so long for the drone to be shot down tends to indicate that otherwise the antics of the drone operators are not having that much of an impact and they are desperate to get their aircraft shot down for the publicity.
Once an activist group get themselves a contrived title, they think they're a supreme deity....
I love animals too. But, pigeon shootings? The town council in most small towns would buy the shells if you would kill the pigeons that flock to the town square. Sorry about their little toy helicopter, but you get what you deserve.
No sigs in BETA. Beta SUCKS.
So who's bright idea was it to choose a robot flying thing as the weapon of choice against a bunch of rednecks with guns who enjoy shooting at flying things... hey if we send up enough robots they will eventually run out of ammo and have to leave the pigeons alone!
As the Cat from Red Dwarf would say... I know this game, its called gun and pigeon, and there is only one way to win... don't be the pigeon... well unless you believe those lying cartoons.
Were standard rounds shot into the sky?
What makes you think the shooters would need anything more than birdshot for a flying bit of ABS plastic, nylon, and a lithium battery and a couple of PCB boards? If you could hit it, a single BB or pellet from a decent-quality air rifle or a "wrist-rocket"-type slingshot could take one of those quad-rotor R/C models out.
If the hunters were smart, they'd get themselves a net-gun and capture these things mostly intact, then sell them on Ebay to finance more live pigeon shoots while loudly and publicly crediting this animal rights group for helping sponsor them.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
Here's the FAA altitude regulations:
Title 14, Code of Federal Regulations, Section 91.119 Minimum safe altitudes; general
Except when necessary for takeoff or landing, no person may operate an aircraft below the following altitudes;
(a) Anywhere. An altitude allowing, if a power unit fails, an emergency landing without undue hazard to persons or property on the surface.
(b) Over congested areas. Over any congested area of a city, town, or settlement, or over any open air assembly of persons, an altitude of 1,000 feet above the highest obstacle within a horizontal radius of 2.000 feet of the aircraft.
(c) Over other than congested areas.
An altitude of 500 feet above the surface except over open water or sparsely populated areas. In that case, the aircraft may not be operated closer than 500 feet to any person, vessel, vehicle, or structure.
(d) Helicopters. Helicopters may be operated at less than the minimums prescribed In paragraph (b) or (c) of this section if the operation is conducted without hazard to persons or property on the surface. In addition, each person operating a helicopter shall comply with routes or altitudes specifically prescribed for helicopters by the Administrator.
Helicopter operations may be conducted below the minimum altitudes set for fixed-wing aircraft. The reason? The helicopter's unique operating characteristics, the most important of which is its ability to execute pinpoint emergency landings during power failure. Further, the helicopter's increased use by law enforcement and emergency medical service agencies requires added flexibility in the application of many FAA provisions.
So, let me get this right, people who are both trespassing and spying get mad that their "drone" gets shot down? There's nothing legitimate about using a "drone" like this. Just because someone happens to be an "activist" doesn't mean they get a free pass to spy on people and trespass on their property.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
“the predictable outrage generated by gruesome videos showing captive pigeons getting released from wooden crates, attempting to fly away, only to get blasted within seconds by a shooter who’s apparently only a few yards away, reinforces both the ethical stance and the financial status of animal activists who want to ban not just canned hunting but much of animal agriculture,” read an editorial in the Drovers CattleNetwork, a beef industry news periodical."
In other words, they're not killing pests. They are doing absolutely nothing to improve the environment. They are purposely breeding these birds in captivity, then releasing and redmisting them, for the sole purpose of their own entertainment.
I'm sorry, but these arn't hunters. They're 5 year olds in grown up redneck bodies who are too stupid to figure out the controls on an X-Box.
What are the FAA and other rules, if any, regarding model airplanes and other unmanned flying machines?
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
FTFA
>âoeSHARK used the drone to successfully videotape illegal animal abuse committed at the pigeon shoot for nearly the entire day,â
No they didn't.
Pigeon shooting is legal.
http://bensalem.patch.com/articles/da-dismisses-pigeon-shoot-citations
And good luck getting pigeon shooting banned in PA, or any other kind of shooting and hunting. The first day of deer season is a state holiday, for instance.
--
BMO
>> your neighbors dropping the bass at 2am
Isn't that animal abuse too?
If someone is disrupting your ability to legally use your private property but they are not committing a crime in the process, we have a remedy:
A civil suit seeking an injunction against future similar behavior and damages for past losses.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
?? It was clearly a 12guage.
The best weapon to take down an object of that size at that distance would be a 12 gauge with a choke and birdshot. That's exactly what they used. A rifle would be stupid... hard to hit a flying target and do less damage.
>> your neighbors dropping the bass at 2am
>Isn't that animal abuse too?
Only if the neighbors survive the first shots you fire.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
I'm trying to convince my co-worker to let me take some that has invaded his shed. He lives way out in the country, I'd absolutely eat a pigeon that has been eating seeds and bugs. I wouldn't eat the city birds that eat garbage and live in over populated disease filled roosts.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
If I fly a drone in my neighbor girl's backyard who likes to sunbathe in the nude is that OK? Oh wait, that is obviously private property and makes me a peeping tom. Hmmm, can I fly a drone over the fence into a nudist colony then and take pictures there? Hmm... still seems wrong huh? Is it not wrong if everyone had clothes on? I mean, until I started trespassing I didn't know one way or the other.
People like this group disgust me. Likely as much as anyone who eats meat disgusts this rabid group of vegan hippies who have nothing better to do then attempt to dictate to some hunters that they shouldn't kill a bunch of rats with wings. What also disgusts me is that anyone would farm grow such vermin (outside of medical testing), but that is another discussion entirely.
I'm not sure if you follow PETA's actions very closely but the legality of other peoples actions has no bearing on whether PETA harasses them.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
If PETA is using these tactics to catch these hunter's in the act, I would assume that whatever the hunters are doing is already illegal.
First, its not PETA, and even if it were thats a terrible assumption to make. What PETA wants has no correlation with what is legal and in many cases no correlation with what is sane.
Plus, the article seems to indicate that what they are doing is NOT illegal. This group (SHARK) simply doesnt like it.
In TFA, they are complaining that the sheriff isn't doing anything about their $4000 drone getting shot down.
Maybe the officers are being generous, and considering $4000 in damage a painful enough lesson. After all, they *could* just arrest them for interfering with a legal hunt.
[End Of Line]
Birds are not shot with rifles, they are shot with shotguns, also sometimes called scatter guns. These are smooth bore weapons, no rifling, that can fire out "shot" which is a collection of small pellets. How small varies depending on the shot load. For bird hunting "birdshot" is used. The largest would be about 4mm though that is rarely used, more commonly it is around 2.5mm. The purpose of this is threefold:
1) To increase the area of effect. Point shooting a small, moving, target is very hard. Shot spreads out and thus provides a wider hitbox. It makes it far easier.
2) To decrease damage to the target. A high powered rifle round could annihilate much of a bird, rendering any meat one might get useless (remember this was all developed back when it was hunting for sustenance). Light shot causes shallower wounds.
3) Safety. So long as the gun is fired above the horizon, it is of no danger. The shot is metal spheres, and thus cannot maintain a ballistic trajectory. Due to their small size, they are very subject to friction and lose their kinetic energy quickly. When they fall to the ground, they are not dangerous.
So no, there will be no problems with someone missing and hitting a neighbour. For a bullet to be dangerous over long distances it needs to be fired from a rifled weapon. The spin stabilizes it and allows it to maintain a ballistic trajectory and thus its energy even over very long distance. Thus when fired at an upward angle it could indeed fly for a long time and hit with lethal force.
For all those reasons, you'll see something like this done with 12ga shotguns loaded with #6-8 birdshot, not a 7.62x51mm rifle loaded with BTHP rounds.
Lost in the discussion of legality and ethics is a simple question: what kind of pussy needs pigeons released from a box at short range to score a kill? Why not just shoot them in the box and call yourself an accomplished sportsman?
Bit of advice: When shooting at targets in the air, hunters generally use a shotgun, IE a smoothbore firearm loaded with little balls of lead or bismuth* alloys. In any case, shotguns loaded with shot are hazardous for far shorter distances, which is why you're allowed to fire them into the air.
Given that they were hunting pigeons, shooting at the drone with a rifle would require the 'dipshit' to go back to his vehicle or building and retrieve a rifle, and it's a tough shot.
It's far more likely many of the hunters 'donated' a shot or two at the drone with their pigeon guns. Pigeons relatively small birds, a commonly recommended size is #7.5. As Dick Cheney so ably demonstrated while hunting quail using the same #7.5 shot you'd expect for pigeon, you can easily survive being shot in the face with it merely 30 yards away.
Given the way the protestors tend to operate, I can fully believe them going 'closer! closer! to the point that the drone ends up within easy range** even for short range shot. Then it's just a matter of a 'lucky hit', which isn't hard when each shot is tossing ~250 pellets at the target.
*Less enivornmentally hazardous than lead.
**With this type of shot, it's more a question of penetration at range than the hitting itself. If they're not doing enough damage, I'd imagine that a few might of had some shells loaded with larger pellets, perhaps #4-5, which would have more energy out that far, at the expense of fewer balls.
I don't read AC A human right
One other fact nobody has mentioned is that by flying this over people, PETA is also violating several provisions of the code of conduct established b the Academy of Model Aeronautics (AMA) intended to help keep the public safe. Model helicopters in the $4K range are no-joke dangerous if they hit someone. This sort of activity (especially using a helicopter to harass people) puts at risk the rights of geeks everywhere to build and fly model aircraft, by encouraging legislators and bureaucrats to pass new laws and regulations.
AMA code
If any of the PETA people doing this are AMA members, I hope they have their memberships revoked...
Renew! Renew! Renew!