The View From Inside A Fireworks Show

kdataman (1687444) writes "There is a breathtaking video on Youtube of someone flying a quadcopter around and through a professional fireworks display. Of course, it was an illegal and dangerous thing to do. It also may inspire someone else to do something even more dangerous. But even so, I have watched it 4 times and get goosebumps every time. An article in Forbes says that unit is a DJI Phantom 2 with a GoPro Hero 3 Silver camera. The fireworks are in West Palm Beach, Florida."

Comments

Illegal and Dangerous?

[TechyImmigrant]

Why on Earth did TFA call it 'illegal and dangerous'?

It's only dangerous to the drone. There are no humans up there to crash into.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Twinbee]

Perhaps he meant dangerous if the firework destroys the copter, making it crash and potentially hit someone?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Ken_g6]

Or worse, if the copter crashes into fireworks on the ground waiting to go off. Kaboom!

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[SuperTechnoNerd]

Read about the new ridiculous rules the FAA imposed about drones.. Then you will understand.
Don't you know we are living in a time when someone does something cool, it is automatically illegal?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[sjames]

It was over water, so even if it caught fire, it would just splash.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Thiez]

If it flies at approximately the same height as where the fireworks explode, how would that happen?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Read about the new ridiculous rules the FAA imposed about drones...

Until some moron flys one into the path of a commercial airliner, small plane, or helicopter, and people die - than it's "why isn't the FAA doing something about this?"

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Rich0]

Read about the new ridiculous rules the FAA imposed about drones.. Then you will understand. Don't you know we are living in a time when someone does something cool, it is automatically illegal?

What rules? I see nothing in the Code of Federal Regulations or US Code covering these matters. A Federal Court has already ruled that all these FAA press releases have no binding power over anybody, dismissing the only case the FAA has brought which has gone to judgement so far.

Federal agencies can't just issue press releases and demand that people follow them. The US is a nation governed by laws, which means the government needs a law or regulation to cite when taking action against somebody.

I don't deny that the FAA has the legal authority to create regulations governing UAVs. They just haven't done it yet.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[roger10-4]

It's dangerous because the copter could have collided with the firework before it reached proper altitude. Subsequently, this could have altered it's trajectory such that it went somewhere it shouldn't (such as the spectators) or detonated at a lower altitude than it should. Maybe I'm just an old fuddy-duddy, but you don't add uncontrolled elements to a dangerous environment that is supposed to be highly controlled for public safety.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it dangerous? Oh, I don't know... maybe because of SCIENCE? PHYSICS? Fucking GRAVITY?

A shell hits the copter and disables it. As it falls, another shell hits it early on in its trajectory and gets bounced into the crowd.

Wow, took me 3 whole seconds to figure that out.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Nkwe]

Maybe and maybe not. There is always the chance that the firework could malfunction on it's own. Possible malfunction is one of they many reasons that in professional shows, no one gets to sit under where the fireworks are intended to go or anywhere a wind shift or malfunction may take them. I suppose if a drone collided with a mortar very close to the ground as the mortar was being launched it might alter the trajectory, but at the altitude from where the pictures were being taken, the firework has gone where it is going to go.

Acknowledged that in some smaller shows you used to be able to sit right under the fireworks and having the smoldering hunks of cardboard rain down on you. This was kind of cool, but in my experience, hasn't been an option for a long time.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

What if the copter is flying lower, and a shell deflects off it significantly before its explosion stage?

Imagine if that happened in Boston, where they launch the things off a barge in the middle of the (fairly narrow) Charles River that's lined on both sides with both spectators and buildings. You can see that it doesn't take much of an effect on the trajectory of the shell before things start getting scary.

This copter is flying high. Only a couple of hundred feet before things get scary. In my vernacular, I call that "dangerous"

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[sjames]

Even granting the unlikely event of a collision, The shell weighs more than the copter, it isn't going to stop dead and it's not going to go near people. This is especially true since you might have noticed that the higher flying shells were bursting at the copter's height.

Since you believe the people not worried by this are fucking, I guess that means you're not fucking? Perhaps that's why you're so uptight? :-)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[spire3661]

Sensationalism sells.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Please re-read my last sentence.

Yes, this copter was flying high. Would take a split second for it to dive down. Or be trivial for anybody else to purposefully fly a drone at 50 feet above the ground... in the dark right up to the launch site.

If you're at all uncomfortable with any old yahoo coming along and doing that, you agree with it being "dangerous"

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[edxwelch]

Reminds me of this dilbert cartoon: http://www.dilbert.com/fast/20...

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[khallow]

The crowd shouldn't be that close to the fireworks in the first place. They have to assume that shells will do that anyway say due to a mortar tipping over.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[MrKaos]

Read about the new ridiculous rules the FAA imposed about drones...

Until some moron flys one into the path of a commercial airliner, small plane, or helicopter, and people die - than it's "why isn't the FAA doing something about this?"

Rules won't stop someone from doing that because it's obviously intended to try to hurt someone. I say try because in a battle between a jet engine with the power to push 400 tons of steel into the sky VS a drone I'm going to put my money on the jet engine lasting long enough for them to turn around and land again. Anything with more planning than that is an attack.

Most of the people who have been here for a while know how to do these things but choose not to because they don't want to fuck it up for people who want to do something cool. Assholes do these things because they don't have enough imagination to do something cool.

In reality this is the argument, the cool people who want to do something cool with technology VS the assholes who want to do something assholic with technology and fucking things up for the cool people. They're the people that do something assholic and force authorities to kneejerk into making anti asshole regulations, which also prevents people from doing something cool.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, this copter was flying high. Would take a split second for it to dive down. Or be trivial for anybody else to purposefully fly a drone at 50 feet above the ground... in the dark right up to the launch site.

Split second? No. Falling from a height of 500 feet would take approximately 5.5 seconds, discounting air resistance. There is no way this drone could drop that far "in a split second."

If they were "right up to the launch site", there would be too many lift charges going off and too much smoke for them to see where the craft was, so that's not possible either. Even IF one of the shells were to hit the copter, they weigh MUCH MORE than this thing does, so physics dictates their path would barely be affected at all. They would likely go right through the copter, deviate by a couple of degrees, and the pieces of the copter would splash into the water.

If you're at all uncomfortable with any old yahoo coming along and doing that, you agree with it being "dangerous"

I'm sorry, "dangerous" != "something that makes me uncomfortable." Let me guess, you think guns are dangerous because they look scary to you, right?

Grow a pair, you fucking pussy.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

How would any kind of FAA rules deter such a moron? There are already laws against that.

When you're talking about adding to the body of administrative and regulatory law, you _should_ be talking about tackling a pre-existing, persistent problem which the existing laws have proven an inadequate deterrence. In fact, when we're talking about laws any sort this should be the context, but especially in administrative law.

When you're crafting regulations based on fear, hypotheticals, and collective imagination... there's a phrase for that, "security theater".

Anyhow, disrupting an airliner with a drone... are you kidding me? There's not a court in this country that wouldn't throw somebody in prison for that, even if there was no such thing as the FAA.

Same thing with the laser pointers issue. Pointing a laser pointer is assault & battery. Assaulting a pilot while he's flying a plane with 300 passengers... that's easily a one-way ticket to the jailhouse, presuming the judge wasn't too lenient. (And he could choose to be lenient even if there were ridiculously specific laws addressing laser pointers and pilots, as at the Federal level and in most states judges aren't bound by mandatory sentencing, as it's generally understood to be a violation of due process because it's the judge's job to determine degree of culpability based on the defendant's state of mind and the circumstances, not some suit in Washington with zero context.)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, he's volating the existing (and still relevant until November) rules regarding remote controlled model aircraft (RCMA). He is clearly above 400 feet in altitude and if he is flying by first person view and not line of sight that is also illegal. I am all for flying RCMA like the one he used. They are NOT drones! I wish people would stop calling them that, including the FAA! We've been flying aricraft like them for years in fields and even in set races at abondoned air strips since the 1970s for crying out loud; with cameras aboard since the 1980s! What's the deal now? The military buys large autonomous aerial vehicles (have you seen a real Predator drone? BIG!) to do surveillance and operations and all of a sudden everyone with a RC helicopter is operating a drone? Shenanigans!

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[augahyde]

Actually, they have. It falls under other rules for model aircraft. FAA limits model aircraft to a height of 500 feet and, if within 5 miles of an airport, the airport must be notified. Many commercial fireworks go as high as a 1000 feet. My guess is that the copter flew to at least 1100 feet for some of the shots.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, he's volating the existing (and still relevant until November) rules regarding remote controlled model aircraft (RCMA). He is clearly above 400 feet in altitude and if he is flying by first person view and not line of sight that is also illegal. I am all for flying RCMA like the one he used. They are NOT drones! I wish people would stop calling them that, including the FAA! We've been flying aricraft like them for years in fields and even in set races at abondoned air strips since the 1970s for crying out loud; with cameras aboard since the 1980s! What's the deal now? The military buys large autonomous aerial vehicles (have you seen a real Predator drone? BIG!) to do surveillance and operations and all of a sudden everyone with a RC helicopter is operating a drone? Shenanigans!

Forgot to caveat, if this was done in the U.S. YMMV by country. :)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[robbak]

Professional fireworks are mortar-fired shells, not rockets that can go off-course if nudged. So if a shell hit the drone on the way up, it would smash straight through it and keep on going. There is not enough mass in a drone, and a drone is not solid enough, to deflect the solid mass of a firework shell travelling at speed. It might not quite reach the same height by a few meters, or might end up a couple of feet off target, but neither of these things would matter.

And if the drone is up at altitude where the shells explode, then there is even less speed involved. The shell has reached it's height - so what if it taps a drone before detonating.

There is also whole lot of sky, and both shells and drones are small. The chance of the two coming together is practically nil.

Amazing pictures captured with zero risk. Images from a drone up there amongst it all should be a permanent feature of firework presentations.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[dougmc]

FAA limits model aircraft to a height of 500 feet

No it doesn't.

The 400 (not 500) foot figure comes from FAA advisory circular 91-57 made back in 1981, and the key thing about this is that it's *advisory*, not mandatory.

The AMA safety code says "Not fly higher than approximately 400 feet above ground level within three (3) miles of an airport without notifying the airport operator." -- but those are just safety rules for AMA members (and a good idea for everybody) -- but they do not have the force of law behind them.

Now, the FAA may change the laws in the future, but so far ... this 400 foot ceiling people talk about does not exist. (Some places have restricted airspace ... that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about this blanket 400 foot height limit people keep bringing up that doesn't exist.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[linearz69]

What rules? I see nothing in the Code of Federal Regulations or US Code covering these matters. A Federal Court has already ruled that all these FAA press releases have no binding power over anybody, dismissing the only case the FAA has brought which has gone to judgement so far.

Apples and oranges.

That court ruling is in regard to the process of issuing fines for the use of a UAV for commercial purposes. Most articles I've read about this ruling have take an academic legal argument being made to avoid paying a fine, and have extrapolated it into some huge governmental over reach. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Congress has given the FAA this power to regulate (set rules, levy fine) anything that flies for commercial purpose. This power seems rather clear cut and the court agrees. The court's only issue is that the FAA was ambiguous in defining a UAV for the purpose of issuing fines - that the FAA rules could essentially fine a commercial operator for a paper airplane, which even the FAA agrees would be ridiculous.

The FAA is appealing and they may very well win this as they seem to be working within the laws as written. If this upsets you, blame your congress person, not the FAA. But you probably won't get far unless you have the resources to change public opinion - most people feel the FAA does a good job here. The general thinking is that aerial anarchy is a bad thing.

The "ridiculous rules" linked above completely different here. Those rule may be a case of the FAA exceeding its power - congress specified nothing about regulating the user interface to model airplanes. Those rules are bogus.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[dukeblue219]

Ridiculous? As a pilot I don't want people's toys flying around in my airspace. Hit a plane and there's a real chance you'll kill someone.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[jshackney]

State Codes may limit/restrict use of kites/drones/models/rockets/etc. (Michigan comes to mind), but you are correct, the FAA has published no limitations on such devices. Yet.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[jc42]

Read about the new ridiculous rules the FAA imposed about drones...

Until some moron flys one into the path of a commercial airliner, small plane, or helicopter, and people die - than it's "why isn't the FAA doing something about this?"

Rules won't stop someone from doing that because it's obviously intended to try to hurt someone. I say try because in a battle between a jet engine with the power to push 400 tons of steel into the sky VS a drone I'm going to put my money on the jet engine lasting long enough for them to turn around and land again.

Wait; there were jet aircraft flying through the fireworks display's volume? How did the drone miss getting a picture of that? That'd have been really fun to watch, especially when the fireworks started hitting the airplane.

(Given that there was a fireworks display going on in that airspace at the time, I'm kinda doubtful that there were any pilots in the area who weren't well aware of them. And I also sorta doubt that there were any children running around under the fireworks. That's usually strongly discouraged at fireworks displays, and this one was over water. ;-)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Drethon]

Because it left the ground, these days anything operated outside of the military that is off the ground is bad... or so it seems.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[jc42]

Ridiculous? As a pilot I don't want people's toys flying around in my airspace. Hit a plane and there's a real chance you'll kill someone.

If you're a pilot who's "airspace" includes a volume in which a fireworks display is scheduled, please informs us of that fact, because I don't think I'd ever want to be a passenger in a plane controlled by a pilot like you. The possibility that your plane might hit a drone would be the least of my worries. ;-)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[sjames]

So because a deranged person might conceivably drive a car through a playground, nobody should drive because it's dangerous?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[sjames]

What happens if the drone is actually a nuclear aircraft carrier re-fitted with anti-gravity propulsion reverse engineered from the Roswell crash?

We can what if all day, but it doesn't amount to anything because that's not what was done.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[mbeckman]

Techyimmigrant: It's unsafe because the drone operator could lose control due to fireworks damage, resulting in high-speed powered flight into the crowd. Small model rotorcraft have maimed and killed people, usually gruesomely. Also, it's illegal to fly a drone above 400', and outside the direct sight of the operator. This drone violated both of those restrictions.

As a helicopter pilot, I dread drones. I've seen them numerous times near events that I am legally and safely filming, and even around airports. Unless we get drone idiots to stop doing stupid, dangerous stunts like this, we will soon have a tragedy taking many lives.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[romons]

Why on Earth did TFA call it 'illegal and dangerous'?

It's only dangerous to the drone. There are no humans up there to crash into.

He could be hit by a firework, causing the firework to go off course. Not likely, but you never know.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[mbeckman]

I say try because in a battle between a jet engine with the power to push 400 tons of steel into the sky VS a drone I'm going to put my money on the jet engine lasting long enough for them to turn around and land again.

You would lose that bet. Turbine aircraft can be disabled by stray metal bits as small as a single bolt. An entire drone, with many metal components, would undoubtedly render a turbine engine inoperable. For this reason, airport operators routinely inspect and pick up all debris on runways and taxiways. It's called FOD (foreign object damage), and is an ever-present risk to aircraft.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[lgw]

More than that: fireworks go off early sometimes. I've seen them go off in the launcher, and go off at low elevation above the launcher. It's not a safety risk at all: it's planned for. (Also, these mortal shells aren't all that accurate to begin with, so hitting a drone on the way is probably noise in the safety margins anyhow.)

Very cool video. I actually saw a fireworks display once from the height at which the shells were bursting - coolest thing I've ever seen. Glad more people can see this!

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Jarik C-Bol]

Illegal, because to film this, he probably flew above the 500 foot RC ceiling, as well as flying at night in a cloud of firework smoke makes following the "maintain visual contact with the aircraft" rule virtually impossible. Dangerous, because if the craft where to be hit, and not entirely disabled, it could easily veer into a vector that took it well out of pilot control, and end up crashing into the general public at large, all of which makes the FAA pretty unhappy.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Tablizer]

The biggest risk is probably secondary debris damaging the drone enough to make it fly off course and smash into viewers. The controller may not know it was hit and fiddle with the controls to try to re-establish control, not knowing they are guiding it up some angry lawyer's ass.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[BarefootClown]

No, he'd win it. Even if the engine immediately went to zero thrust, the other engine would still be sufficient to find a suitable landing field. In fact, such things are practiced regularly, both simulated (for large jets) and in real life (smaller aircraft). It'd be expensive to fix, but entirely survivable, given a suitably-competent pilot.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Runaway1956]

Not all jet aircraft have multiple engines. And, with single engine aircraft, the odds of having a suitably-competent pilot at the controls is somewhat lower than with huge passenger or cargo carriers.

Basically - GGP is overly optimistic, GP seems pessimistic, and you defend GGP's optimism.

Let's just say that when the shit hits the fan (literally, in this case) bad things can happen. I'd rather not be aboard any aircraft in flight when something is sucked through the turbine(s). The ultimate catastrophic failure of a turbine COULD take the wing off. Highly unlikely, but it COULD do so. That's a ride that I would like to take a pass on, thank you very much.

Remotely related to such a failure (note the word "remotely", and let me stress that word) I had a small engine start knocking on a job site many years ago. Little 20 horse Briggs and Stratton. Before it could be shut down, the piston came out THROUGH the side of the engine, sailed about 150 feet, and impacted a concrete building. The impact caused some chipping in the concrete. Had there been a window right there, with someone looking out the window - we would have had a serious injury, and a possible fatality.

Catastrophic failures are pretty unpredictable - that is why they are "catastrophic".

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Zenin]

Hit who?

No one hangs around under a fireworks display and in this instance it was all over water.

The worst think it's going to hurt is a fish swimming too close to the surface.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

You think an aircraft is "400 tons of steel"???

I know how much authority to give to YOUR comment :)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

"You would lose that bet. "

Er, no, he wouldn't. He didn't say it would not be damaged, just that it would 'last long enough...'

A drone strike is much like a bird strike in energy terms. Bird strikes damage engines, but they are built not to disintegrate catastrophically as a result...

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Cyberdyne]

I say try because in a battle between a jet engine with the power to push 400 tons of steel into the sky VS a drone I'm going to put my money on the jet engine lasting long enough for them to turn around and land again.

You might want to rethink that after being reminded of jet airliners being brought down by birds - not an ounce of metallic content, just a few pounds of meat and soft lightweight bones - or the 747 which almost crashed after all four engines failed from ingesting some ash. (Fortunately, they happened to be relatively near an airport and were high enough to glide for over a hundred miles, which bought them just enough time to restart an engine while they had been preparing to ditch in the ocean, buying them enough time to limp to the nearest runway - although all four engines were damaged beyond repair.)

For that matter, the French Concorde which crashed in 2000 was destroyed by a single thin strip of metal, 17 inches long and just over an inch wide, less than four ounces: essentially, a slightly larger than average metal ruler. It didn't even go into an engine, it just burst a tire - violently enough that the ten pound lump of rubber ruptured the wing and number 5 fuel tank, causing the crash which killed everyone on board.

That was a single 4 oz strip of metal hitting a tire. A pound of bolts or nails will destroy the engine - or a metal drone engine that size.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Opportunist]

Since this was a professional fireworks display, it is safe to assume that the person or organization orchestrating it had to take into consideration that what goes up must come down, i.e. the area where the stuff that goes boom up there lands eventually is "safe". Also because the odd black shell may come down, and the quad isn't that much heavier. Essentially, if it goes down it's basically a black shell without the possibility to detonate.

If it could hit someone in that process, the fireworks display may have been much but not very professional!

Re: Illegal and Dangerous?

[augahyde]

So the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 doesn't count as legislation?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Opportunist]

Everything cool is either illegal, immoral or fattening.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

I am aware of at least four instances in 2014 where *idiots* were flying these things in CLASS B airspace near the approaches to airports. I predict this number will continue to go up, to be followed by a heavy handed response from law makers.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[delt0r]

Not all jet aircraft have multiple engines.

Name one that doesn't.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[kyrsjo]

The F35 is a single engine aircraft.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Runaway1956]

http://planes.findthebest.com/...

http://planes.findthebest.com/...

If you prefer a commercial or private jet example, this should work.

http://planes.findthebest.com/...

I think that twin engine jets are most common, there are triple engine jets out there, and quads aplenty in the larger craft. But, yes, there are single jet engine aircraft.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

But the water could be filled with gasoline and then it could light THE WHOLE RIVER ON FIRE!!!

Can I have my "safety expert" certification now?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Read TFA again and you'll see that the government really does pose a significant danger to whoever does this.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Thousands of bomber crew were shot down during WWII in similar circumstance protecting your rights to do this.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[ganjadude]

my father shoots off professional shows and I asked him about this. he said the worst case scenario he can think of would be if the drone was low, like within 20 feet of the launch and it blasted it with a direct hit. he said the crowds generally would be safe as they do take mishaps like a rogue firework into consideration when planning the location and the distance of the viewers. on the other hand that could potentially cause issues with the people setting them off. he says where the thing was in relation to the show, hes thinking about doing it himself from now on at all of his shows

Re: Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

The FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 doesn't restrict model aircraft altitude in any way other than to say they must give way to manned aircraft. It specifically reiterates that FAA rules do not apply to hobby or recreational uses of model aircraft.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Picass0]

Your reasonable point makes it impossible for for the OP to be on his self-righteous high horse so let us not speak of it again.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Chrisq]

Read about the new ridiculous rules the FAA imposed about drones...

Until some moron flys one into the path of a commercial airliner, small plane, or helicopter, and people die - than it's "why isn't the FAA doing something about this?"

You mean "until some Muslim flys one ....

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[shipofgold]

The problem isn't one guy showing up and doing something cool. The problem is next year 100 guys show up all with their drones all wanting to fly through the same fireworks display...cuz its cool.

Guaranteed, a couple of those 100 will have had a few too many brewskys....and that will lead to a new level of creativity/coolness. And that will lead to hospital visits.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[ganjadude]

8 inch shells are almost NEVER used, at least in the USA, the shells at the NYC show for example the largest shell is a 6 inch, the avg is 2.5 inch to 4 inch

Re: Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps, it is you who should stop flying near events. You create a much larger (probably thousands of times worse, assuming it could be quantized) hazard flying than any commercial drone being sold right now, or in the conceivable future.

You have a much larger machine with more Flammable fuel, having much larger mass (Hell, your body is more dangerous at altitude than the drone) and being human, are more likely to be subject to pilot error. Should the machine fail catastrophically, at minimum you, and any camera crew would be killed. Compared with something rather light-weight falling from the sky.

Plus the drones can get to places you can't safely fly, such as the middle of a fireworks display! It requires much less in the way of resources. Hell, your fuel cost from one flight would likely cover every done you've seen!

I'm not trying to be an ass, but how should you be able to compete, with something cheaper, more numerous, and able to do things you simply can't do?

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Rich0]

Actually, they have. It falls under other rules for model aircraft.

As others have pointed out, the FAA has not issued any rules for model aircraft, either. They've only issued advisory circulars.

Hence my point about "nothing in the Code of Federal Regulations or US Code covering these matters." If you feel differently, cite the appropriate regulation. For example, 14 CFR 121.317(h) says that you're not allowed to smoke in a commercial airliner bathroom. That is a federal regulation and enforceable in court.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

>and the key thing about this is that it's *advisory*, not mandatory.

You don't know what an administrative rulemaking is, apparently. The advisory clarifies existing rules. Sorry, but the FAA does regulate models to below 400 feet, and the airspace below it. The AMA is a confused restatement, as the 3 miles of airport part is not a logical "and", it is an "also".

>this 400 foot ceiling people talk about does not exist.

Good luck with that fiction.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Rich0]

What rules? I see nothing in the Code of Federal Regulations or US Code covering these matters. A Federal Court has already ruled that all these FAA press releases have no binding power over anybody, dismissing the only case the FAA has brought which has gone to judgement so far.

Apples and oranges.

That court ruling is in regard to the process of issuing fines for the use of a UAV for commercial purposes. Most articles I've read about this ruling have take an academic legal argument being made to avoid paying a fine, and have extrapolated it into some huge governmental over reach. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Congress has given the FAA this power to regulate (set rules, levy fine) anything that flies for commercial purpose. This power seems rather clear cut and the court agrees. The court's only issue is that the FAA was ambiguous in defining a UAV for the purpose of issuing fines - that the FAA rules could essentially fine a commercial operator for a paper airplane, which even the FAA agrees would be ridiculous.

The court's issue was that the FAA had not "issued an enforceable FAR regulatory rule governing model aircraft" and that subsequent attempts to create policy were "not issued as a notice of proposed rulemaking" and "did not satisfy the requirements of 5 USC 533(d)."

As I stated above, "I don't deny that the FAA has the legal authority to create regulations governing UAVs. They just haven't done it yet."

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[kwbauer]

"Federal agencies can't just issue press releases and demand that people follow them." Well, that ship sailed a while back, unfortunately, as far too many people believe that is how it works and our current "beloved leader" seems to spend the majority of his time furthering this notion.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[kwbauer]

Well, that is exactly half of the arguments used for banning guns. The other one is "because other countries don't have freedoms we shouldn't either." Neither is really a valid reason but...

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[kwbauer]

Yes, we do know because of physics. They called and said you are wrong. Do the research yourself and learn something.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[kwbauer]

"similar" in the same way that this little toy is similar to an Apache? I've never heard of any "raids" where we flew over some Nazi or Japanese celebrations but maybe they are still highly classified. Anti-aircraft shells have a bunch of metal that comes apart and becomes known as shrapnel. It is this metal that does all the damage to aircraft. Fireworks have paper and a small bit of flammable stuff. Not quite as similar as you might think.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[ChrisMaple]

The Charles River is over 1500 feet wide near MIT. If a firework were aimed at the shore, there's a good chance it wouldn't make it.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[MrKaos]

Not all jet aircraft have multiple engines. And, with single engine aircraft, the odds of having a suitably-competent pilot at the controls is somewhat lower than with huge passenger or cargo carriers.

Me, you, and everyone you know is unlikely ever to be a passenger on one of these aircraft. The scenario we were talking about is drone vs a commercial jet so I don't really understanding what your point is.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[MrKaos]

I say try because in a battle between a jet engine with the power to push 400 tons of steel into the sky VS a drone I'm going to put my money on the jet engine lasting long enough for them to turn around and land again.

You might want to rethink that after being reminded of jet airliners being brought down by birds - not an ounce of metallic content, just a few pounds of meat and soft lightweight bones- or the 747 which almost crashed after all four engines failed from ingesting some ash. (Fortunately, they happened to be relatively near an airport and were high enough to glide for over a hundred miles, which bought them just enough time to restart an engine while they had been preparing to ditch in the ocean, buying them enough time to limp to the nearest runway - although all four engines were damaged beyond repair.)

That was a whole flock of birds that brought that first aircraft you mentioned down. The second aircraft, British Airways flight 009, the "some" ash you are talking about was tonnes of highly abrasive volcanic ash from an *active* volcano.

I qualified these scenarios by saying that anymore than a single drone would be an attack.

For that matter, the French Concorde which crashed in 2000 was destroyed by a single thin strip of metal, 17 inches long and just over an inch wide, less than four ounces: essentially, a slightly larger than average metal ruler. It didn't even go into an engine, it just burst a tire - violently enough that the ten pound lump of rubber ruptured the wing and number 5 fuel tank, causing the crash which killed everyone on board.

That was a single 4 oz strip of metal hitting a tire. A pound of bolts or nails will destroy the engine - or a metal drone engine that size.

That was the initiating event. In that case it was also recorded that the flight engineer spooled down that engine without orders from the pilot and that wheel shims and uneven loading of the aircraft contributed to the accident.

Any scenarios like these would require multiple drones, and would thereby constitute a deliberately constructed attack.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[TechyImmigrant]

Why on Earth did TFA call it 'illegal and dangerous'?

It's only dangerous to the drone. There are no humans up there to crash into.

He could be hit by a firework, causing the firework to go off course. Not likely, but you never know.

The safety margin around fireworks displays is large enough to cope with a launcher falling over and lobbing the chemical stew directly at or over the crowd. By the time it gets up to the drone it's converted all its kinetic energy to potential energy and the direction of the explosion that follows is immaterial, since it blows in all directions.

Why is this not completely obvious? Don't they teach basic physics in school?

Re: Illegal and Dangerous?

[jabuzz]

Just to drive your point home, happened last year about a mile from where I type this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2...

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Andy Dodd]

Well, as far as flying too close to an airport - I think there are a lot of people in that category that aren't trying to hurt someone, but are just plain stupid.

As far as your assertion that the jet will last long enough to turn around and land again - The landing and takeoff phases for an aircraft (most likely cases where it will hit a small RC aircraft) are the most dangerous ones. Typical RC aircraft have components that are harder/stiffer (worse for a jet engine) than a bird - and a bird into a jet engine on takeoff can be disastrous (see the Miracle on the Hudson - yes that was a rare dual-engine birdstrike, but even a single engine out during the most dangerous parts of a flight is a big deal).

I think the problem is that this video was done by a guy who was screwing around and probably not thinking about negative consequences - if he'd coordinated with the fireworks people to ensure that they agreed there were no safety issues he didn't think about, it would be fine. But now, there's likely to be legislation that is going to be directed at this but contain collateral damage.

See the recent rulings on FPV flight - http://www.faa.gov/about/initi... - I believe this was primarily driven by incidents like http://www.ksdk.com/story/news... (due to timing, not THAT specific one most likely, but similar incidents). End result is - because of some people being completely reckless with FPV flights, the FAA has created an effective blanket ban on FPV flights.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[markana]

This is entirely correct. I fire up to 3" shells (licensed), and those things are *heavy* for their size. They'll go right through your little drone without slowing much if at all. And they won't burst early - that requires fusing, not contact. Low bursts are due to faulty internal fuses, not hitting something. Once the shell bursts, the debris is mostly paper and maybe little bits of clay material. Probably not going to bring down a drone big enough to carry a GoPro.

Now, if you're flying a Predator over my show, we might have an issue. But that's what 6" shells are for...:-)

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why on Earth did TFA call it 'illegal and dangerous'?
 
Because humans have a deeply innate fear of flying things rooted deep in the primitive part of our brain. The sky is completely out of our general daily awareness and bad things can come from the sky and eat you without you ever seeing it coming. We have no control over the sky, and anything we can't control we fear. We like to think we're not, but humans, just like every other animal, are driven by hunger, thirst, sex, and fear, and every other emotion is a corollary or a combination of those four. But it's so pervasive and subtle in our subconscious that people don't even realize when they're being irrationally fearful, which leads to stupid comments like TFA...

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Agent0013]

I know of someone who did fireworks for a town in the USA. They used plenty of 10 and 12 inch morters as well as the 8 and 6 inchers. So I don't know where you got your information, but it is surely incorrect.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

F16, F35, Mirage, and so many more. Stop talking like you know something. You know nothing, deltor.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Harr harr, dumbfuck.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man!

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[sjames]

If you can't take the heat, don't drop the F-bomb.

Re:Illegal and Dangerous?

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, remember when a thin aluminium strip took down Concorde? Yeah, you might want to reassess the danger there.

kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[alen]

one time i was in Augusta, Ga for 4th of July and the river fest and saw the show. you could stand almost under the explosions. not like NYC where you are like 2 miles from the show

same with Shea Stadium, the old Citi Field. you could get closer to the show than watching the official Macy's fireworks

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Anonymous Coward]

In my hometown, you sat so close that embers from the fireworks were pelting your cars as you watched.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

I don't get why American fireworks displays are so small. I'd love to see this copter fly through fireworks in Reykjavík on New Years Eve. The Macy's 4th of july fireworks display in New York shoots off about 10 tons of fireworks. Iceland (most of the population being in Reykjavík and its adjacent municipalities, about 250k people) shoots off about 600 tons of fireworks on New Years, the weight of about 5 adult blue whales. The whole city looks like this for literally about an hour. It's not organized, it's just everyone shooting off an average of about 9 kilograms / 20 pounds per family - some more, some less. You see fireworks like the stuff that copter flew through in little towns of 1-2 thousand people. Even if you only count organized displays, it just seems to be so disproportionately little in the US. Pretty much every festival that does fireworks here shoots off several tons. Or otherwise just burns pretty much everything that's not nailed down. Or as more often is the case, both at the same time.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[ramorim]

Fireworks in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, is really cool too.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[stephenmac7]

It's helpful when your "progressive" government doesn't regulate the industry to the point where it's $20 for a pop-it.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

What's the actual price there?

I think a lot of people spend so much here because the profits go to the rescue services. Also, I guess since we have no military we've got to blow something up ;)

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

Whoops, included the wrong link for the "The whole city looks like this" part - it was supposed to be this link. The first one is a link to just a small festival display.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure it will just get replaced with a safer HTML5 version someday.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Anonymous Coward]

about 600 tons of fireworks on New Years, the weight of about 5 adult blue whales

Thanks for a new unit of measurement: adult blue whales of fireworks. Comparing fireworks to adult blue whales really helps make your number something I can relate to in my everyday life.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[rasmusbr]

The main reason why many governments have regulations for how much fireworks you can fire off in one night is that fireworks produce toxic smoke. Reykjavik is a relatively small city situated in what I believe is a windy area far away from any other major urban centers, so I would think that the potential for humans to be exposed being exposed to smoke from fireworks is unusually low there.

Or perhaps the city just wants to live up to its name...

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Anonymous Coward]

stangely enough all three of your links just lead me to the same page of images including the three nordic death tenors and a guy with budding hair antlers.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[drkim]

about 600 tons of fireworks on New Years, the weight of about 5 adult blue whales

Thanks for a new unit of measurement: adult blue whales of fireworks. Comparing fireworks to adult blue whales really helps make your number something I can relate to in my everyday life.

Good point.
Think of 600 tons as 27.3 Viking Longboats, each boat loaded with 160 Aardvarks.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

Hmm, interesting, they actually limit how many can be shot off?

Yes, your description of size, wind, etc are accurate. Also it's a rather moist climate, not much fire risk. And most buildings are concrete. And the city is half surrounded by ocean. And since the money goes to support the rescue services, the incentive is to encourage people to shoot off as many as possible, rather than the other way around.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

??? I don't see that all. The links are just google image searches on "reykjavík fireworks", "brenna gamlárskvöldið", and "jóðhátíð í eyjum". Oh, hmm.... I'm betting that because I'm searching from Iceland I get differently biased results. I know that my regular google searches at least bias towards Icelandic sites. Okay, well, basically picture this for an hour while several dozen of these are ongoing, or summer festivals like this.

We kinda like fire.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[ShaunC]

Hmm, interesting, they actually limit how many can be shot off?

Never heard of that, anywhere I've been it was always black and white, either fireworks are legal or they aren't. In the US most places where they're illegal it's because of injury and fire risk. They're illegal where I live but nobody really cares, it's about a 10 minute drive to the county line where you can stock up to your heart's content. The police do respond to fireworks calls when Debbie Downer makes a complaint, but unless you're doing something egregious like firing Saturn Missiles in the middle of the road or aiming stuff at someone's house on purpose, they usually just "remind" you that it's illegal and tell you to knock it off.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[ChrisMaple]

Argh! Now I can't get rid of the image of adult blue whales fired 500 feet into the air.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

If there's was any country with that special combination of whale-hunting and pyromania to do it, it'd be Iceland ;)

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[RivenAleem]

Iceland is an island in the North Atlantic. I suspect you to be from somewhere landlocked, where the use of fish as a unit of measurement is as rare as a good tasting perch.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[StikyPad]

Because a) most US cities have ordinances prohibiting arial fireworks (and some prohibit all fireworks) without a permit/license, and b) Many states prohibit the sale of arial fireworks, or limit the size to a few grams, or less than N feet (meters) off the ground, or all of those things.

The better question would be to ask why these regulations exist, and the answer is to prevent this:

http://icelandreview.com/news/...
http://icelandreview.com/news/...

Also Iceland in mid-winter carries a much lower fire risk than much of the US in mid-summer.

I like setting off my own, but there are upsides to municipal displays as well:

* They're usually choreographed.
* They're cheaper (free).
* Less running away from lit fuses and more sitting back and enjoying.

Re:kind of like a small town fireworks show?

[Rei]

There wouldn't be so many injuries if such a large chunk of the people setting them off weren't drunk ;)

Redonkulous

[Anonymous Coward]

So with all this asinine hyperbole this is either an advert or the ramblings of somebody that needs to go outside a bit more.

inb4

[Anonymous Coward]

Man crushed by drone which caught fire from a fireworks display.

Re:GoPro

[Anonymous Coward]

I see you aren't a camera person. Go read up on dynamic range, ISO (sensitivity), sensor noise, pixel size and the past 25 years of optics and you will see why the GoPro does pretty well for its size and price.

this is why we can't have nice things...

[turkeydance]

drone gets hit/diverts fireworks into crowd/drone goes offline/hits car (or close to) nearby highway....hilarity ensues.

Re:this is why we can't have nice things...

[sjames]

If you look closer, the fireworks and the drone are over water. So much more likely, drone struck by fireworks makes a splash, fish startled.

Re: this is why we can't have nice things...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't let PETA find out.

Cool video

[richy freeway]

Crappy camera work but I enjoyed it anyway. Surprised I haven't seen someone do it before (I realise someone may have).

The question remains though, when did this place become digg?

Re:Cool video

[Huntr]

"The question remains though, when did this place become digg?"

Right around Dec '04.

Re:Cool video

[dougmc]

Crappy camera work? I take it you'd do better?

It's not like it's an easy place to put an expensive camera into. Anything bigger than a small R/C plane and they'd have stopped the fireworks entirely -- and personally, I'm sort of surprised that they didn't when they saw this craft up there. The odds of having the craft hit by a shell and crashing into the water were significant as well.

And it's quite dark, so we're stuck with high iso mode.

Personally, I thought it was quite excellent for what it was.

Re:Cool video

[ChrisMaple]

Fireworks are quite bright. I've photographed plenty with 100 ISO film.

Re:GoPro

[pla]

I thought GoPros were supposed to be good.

GoPros really do rock - You just have to turn off the ultra-wide FOV. The originals will go down to 137 degrees, and the GP2s will go down to 90 (basically a normal shot).

That said, it all depends on your intent... While the fisheye distortion seems annoying, how much of this show would the drone have missed with literally half the effective FOV?

Idiotic

[Registered Coward v2]

Cool? Maybe. Idiotic? Definately. It's stupid things like this that ruin it for responsible hobbyists. I have friend who is a fire works pro and the stuff they do to make it safe is endangered by such irresponsible actions. Now get of my lawn.

Re:Idiotic

[Dins]

How is this idiotic? Unless you're talking about the potential idiocy of wasting all that money on a drone and a Gopro camera potentially blown up by fireworks. This was filmed over water. Nobody was in danger except the drone owner's bank account. (And maybe the one in a million chance of the drone falling on the odd boater...)

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

It is idiotic because the filmer probably did not get permission to do what he did from the city, the fireworks performance company, DHS, FAA, etc. So by doing what he did without permission, he's basically pointed out a security oversight of every one of the parties who can now point this film as justification to restrict others from getting permission to do it.

FAA: it shows they have no control over usage of drones

DHS: the video shows a drone can go any where, and they can't prevent it

fireworks performance company: they can't claim copyright on derivative works of their performance

city: the video didn't say where so there was no promotion of the city (or something like that)

Re:Idiotic

[Overzeetop]

Not really. I've been on a commercial crew, and this has effectively zero impact on the safety of the show. The only danger would be the kind discussed by lawyers and insurance companies, neither of which would impact the actual firing safety of a show like this. It was shot over water, and even if this was knocked out of commission and landed on a barge, the weight would be insufficient to damage or misalign any but the smallest (3" or 4" mortar - and those are racked for stability.

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

"..It is idiotic because the filmer probably did not get permission to do what he did..."

Er - reality check. You can't say it IS idiotic because something PROBABLY wasn't done. The most you can say is that it MIGHT HAVE BEEN idiotic (but you don't know).

However, it's people like you, who jump to conclusions about danger without thinking, who are busy ruining the world for the rest of us...

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

Preventing an explosive shell from being redirected into a crowd isn't "banning every reason for living", toilet. I know that my military background makes me much less risk-averse than you, but part of doing adventurous shit means keeping safe. There's nothing manly about unnecessary injury, except in a pansy fantasy superhero world where everybody magically gets up, brushes off their fairy dust and skips away into the Teletubby sunset. Ask mom to increase your allowance so Ayn Rand will let you get on your knees and lick her pussy, freshman. Really stick your tongue in there and tell us all what it tastes like.

Re:Idiotic

[ScentCone]

Nobody was in danger except the drone owner's bank account

Spoken like someone who has never actually built and or operated one.

More likely than a direct hit on the drone by a shell (likely to make the drone drop straight out of the sky, probably in multiple pieces) is the prospect of some debris getting into one or more of the brushless motors. This could cause the motor to overheat, or cause the ESC talking to it to get things wrong. The flight controller can get confused by this, and you could end up with a high battery drain, and the machine doing a nice tilt to one side, with the remaining props spinning way up to try to maintain lift ... presto. From a few hundred feet, the drone could go into a high speed dive at an angle that could very quickly close the distance between the fireworks range (over the water) and the people on the ground. How'd you like 1500g of high-speed hardware coming at your head at, say, 35mph, in the dark, complete with high-speed spinning carbon fiber knives and a flammable LiPo battery onboard.

Beyond all of that, this is about public perception. The complete tool who did this is practically begging to have members of the public pile onto the FAA's existing effort to, in practice, shut down this entire hobby and almost every attempt to put these tools to work in research and business. Gee, thanks.

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

1500g of high-speed hardware coming at your head at, say, 35mph, in the dark, complete with high-speed spinning carbon fiber knives and a flammable LiPo battery onboard

That sounds awesome! Now we just need to mount sharks on! With frickin' lasers, man.

Re:Idiotic

[chispito]

Beyond all of that, this is about public perception. The complete tool who did this is practically begging to have members of the public pile onto the FAA's existing effort to, in practice, shut down this entire hobby and almost every attempt to put these tools to work in research and business. Gee, thanks.

More likely, members of the public will watch the video and think it's great and isn't it great that someone is able to do that. Relax.

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone in a boat underneath a fireworks display is going to have a lot more to worry about than a falling drone :-)

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

Yip the guy flew his quadcopter into a firework show, anything could happen!
Luckily, he was flying inside an anything-could-happen-zone.

Re:Idiotic

[thegarbz]

More importantly we could all get killed by terrorists! Won't someone think of the children!!!!!

You have one of the most extreme cases of alarmism I've seen. I think we need to address your points individually in turn:

1. Flight controller may get confused and attempt to fly the thing. Or more realistically what happens when you lose a prop is the thing flips and splats straight down. Try it one day, or just jump on youtube and watch what happens when a quad suffers complete motor failure. They definitely don't come down at a nice angle, but simply fall out of the sky tumbling as they go.

2. The Phantom 2 is 1kg, this doesn't change anything but I thought I'd point it out since it'll significantly reduce the damage.

3. The Phantom 2 does not have carbon fibre blades. This is quite significant because plastic doesn't hurt when you get hit by it (spoken from experience).

4. It's night time, I think we'll be able to see the bright thing with 6 red and 6 green bright LEDs tumbling towards us, especially since we'll be looking right in its general direction.

5. LiPos aren't bombs. They burn well but they won't kill you, even if they catch fire while they are in your pocket, or on your lap (Google this if you want examples).

6. The public couldn't give a shit. They don't care about you, the drone or the FAA. What they will say is "awesome video" and hit share on Facebook. You know, kind of like everyone doing it right now. (Seriously like 6 people posted this on their wall in the past few days).

Now I wonder how many people die on the way to fireworks in car accidents, or die looking at fireworks while driving, or die getting hit by fireworks (this actually happened at one show I was at, my friend got a lovely payout and a great scar to tell war stories about). But more importantly shouldn't we be focusing on the terrorists? I mean all those people just standing there, in the dark, very little security, lots of people with backpacks. Think about it.

Re:Idiotic

[Anonymous Coward]

"Time to say goodbye" - how appropriate. Is it idiotic if there are 500 of these flying around in a show? What if it is near the approach to an airport?

  This is why we can't have nice things... Stuff like this virtually ensures that there will be over-reaching regulation introduced.

At least it was fun while it lasted.

Re:Idiotic

[russotto]

It's stupid things like this that ruin it for responsible hobbyists.

"Responsible hobbyists" fly planes in a circle over and over again with a group of other retired guys doing the same thing. What's to ruin?

Re:Idiotic

[ScentCone]

Flight controller may get confused and attempt to fly the thing

The flight controller is ALWAYS flying the thing. And if you were paying attention (which you weren't), you'd note that I was talking about how the flight controller might handle the presence of debris gumming up a motor and overheating an ESC. It happens all the time - insects, dust, leaves, etc. As I also pointed out, this stuff will seem mysterious to smug people who obviously have no experience with this stuff in the real world.

The Phantom 2 is 1kg

About half again that much by the time you install gimbal, camera, and VTX for downlink. Regardless, shall we do a test where 1300g hits you in the head at 30+mph? No? Huh.

The Phantom 2 does not have carbon fibre blades. This is quite significant because plastic doesn't hurt when you get hit by it (spoken from experience).

Many people retrofit with CF props. Regardless, the stock props are plenty capable of taking out an eye, or laying open the meat on your face.

LiPos aren't bombs

Though you can use the same Google you're talking about to see lovely video of hot, instant fires caused by multirotors hitting the pavement from a long fall/dive and having their onboard LiPo rupture internally. They are very energetic. Just what we need - video of Lithium-fueled fire on someone's July 4 picnic blanket, right where their kid had been sitting in a crowd.

The public couldn't give a shit. They don't care about you, the drone...

Which explains why the FAA gets a steady stream of phoned-in tips from the public, which they use to issue subpoenas and cease & desist letters threatening fines. Or you could read up on the case of the 17 year old out having a nice time flying FPV in a wide-open public area, up until some lady started to quite literally beat him up for doing so. She gave a shit, enough to commit assault over it. Tip of the iceberg.

Re:Idiotic

[Toad-san]

I can see the drone somehow being hit by a fireworks missile, deflecting that missile, and the missile going who knows where? Back down into the crowd (or worse, the launch site)? If it stayed above the explosions, fine; within them, maybe. But fireworks on that scale are risky at best. Throwing a solid object like some of the larger drones into the middle of them just adds to the danger.

But I must say, even if never done again, that's a wonderful video, perhaps the first ever?

Re:Idiotic

[kwbauer]

Anyone in a boat underneath the display was already violating the restricted area (most likely) and if they weren't then the organizers would not have cared about the drone either.

Re:Idiotic

[kwbauer]

Why would it matter if it were near the approach to an airport? The fireworks themselves are more of a danger than the drone based on the numbers of them up there.

Re:Idiotic

[kwbauer]

Except fireworks aren't missiles in the same way that a baseball or paper airplane is not a missile.

Re:Idiotic

[thegarbz]

So you're basically saying but someone could change the drone in the summary to something bigger and OMG DANGEROUS! Yeah good argument.
The other half of your argument is self defeating. Fires? Yeah because something that may catch fire is really going to kill you. Let me say that again, LiPo batteries do not spontaneously explode. Go get one and throw it really hard into the ground. Yes it may heat up, yes it may eventually catch fire, but if you get burnt as a result it will be because you got some really recessive genes which Darwin postulates may sort themselves out anyway.

In other news someone in my city stabbed someone else because they wanted a cab ride and they felt the cab stopped for the wrong person. Your little old lady has nothing on that, other than a case of the bat-shit insane. So let me commit the True Irish fallacy and say "No true sane person gives a shit". And that can be found by a quick Google search that shows the FAA hasn't done anything about individuals flying yet, only *attempted* to do something about a few commercial cases. So please, share with me your source on the steady stream of phoned-in tips, and the subpoenas and the cease & desist letters. No, Amazon and the guy who filmed the Tornado don't count.

By the way I like how you just pointed to the danger of drones, did you address the rest of what I was talking about? Think about it. With all those damn terrorists about we should ban fireworks and public gatherings. They are far more dangerous than drones.

Re:Idiotic

[ScentCone]

You're right. Our entire culture should only be able to be thoughtful about the safety of any one given situation at a time. People who want to fly RC aircraft should shut up and not worry, at all, about how some idiot is generating bad press and given the uninformed silly people media-hyped things to worry about ... they shouldn't even ADDRESS that issue as long as there is even one angry person anywhere roaming the streets ready to kill over an imagined slight. As a nation, we cannot possibly afford to deal with more than one topic at a time. Speaking of which, how do you have time to scold be when there are people with knives near taxis in your area?

Breathtaking.

[Snufu]

In twenty-four hours this will go from "illegal" to "high demand professional camera service" for promotions, events, etc.

Absolutely Awesome

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand the negative comments here. This is using technology to get a viewpoint of something in a way that a few years previously would have been impossible. Love it.

Re:Absolutely Awesome

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Yes, the shut-in is high in this story. Epic, mega, fabulous. Everyone else can stick their mountain dew/Dworkin monologues up their arses and die.

Re:Absolutely Awesome

[Anubis IV]

I love it too, but just because I love it, doesn't mean that I don't also think it's something that could have turned out really badly. The video clearly shows a number of near misses, and the last thing I want landing on a fireworks barge is a flaming, sparking machine that fell from the sky. Considering these fireworks were all directly over the barges, any near misses he had were also over them.

Even so, that doesn't temper the fact that the video is absolutely outstanding. I'm just glad it turned out okay.

Re:Absolutely Awesome

[thegarbz]

I don't understand the negative comments here.

I do. It's the I don't fly planes because they may crash, and there are possibly terrorists in my basement right now crowd are afraid they may end up on a TV show called "Truly bizarre ways unlucky people die".

They are probably posting the negative comments from their phones while driving down the highway, speeding of course because the government sets those speed limits to collect fines and safety has nothing to do with it.

Re:Absolutely Awesome

[vpness]

this is the most sane post on this subject I've seen. Like the internet, drones are still 'too new' to fall under legislation *which makes sense.* I remember seeing some silly rules regarding early automobiles coming to a cross roads, and the to be crosser having to discharge a weapon to first warn of their impending crossing. Just being curious, I'm looking for rules for proper operation of a drone. Comparisons to model airplanes, estes rockets, kites and hang gliders come to mind. Surely, just like stealing music from the internet is the same as stealing music from a cd in a store, it'd seem that existing rules on the books could be found? I'm not informed enough to propose a decent solution. And the comment of another poster about 'oops, sorry that drone got sucked into an engine, they can always turn around on the other one, why'd you want to limit something soooo cools as drones ?' was ... immature ? And, like this poster, the view was, amazingly stunning. Like CGI.

Re:Absolutely Awesome

[Archon-X]

..as a pyrotechnician, honestly, the biggest risk here is the guy's equipment.
As a general rule of thumb, the minimum safety distance for fireworks is 120% of their maximum range - so even if a rack of mortar tubes falls over towards the public, noone is going to get hit.

There's a huge amount of inertia behind the bombs: it's not hard to imagine (or do the sums) to work out the energy required to hurl a 1KG 150m into the air. In a head on collision between a drone and a decent calibre firework, the firework will win every time..

Re:Zzzzzzz

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, yes, god forbid someone should enjoy something without your blessing, Your Majesty.

If a thing is dangerous with drones...

[Rix]

It's that thing that is dangerous, not the drones. Drones are never going to get any more expensive than they are now. They're only going to get cheaper, more disposable, and harder to trace back to their pilot.

People are going to do whatever they please with them. If some other activity isn't compatible, then it's that activity we'll have to restrict.

Re:If a thing is dangerous with drones...

[rolfwind]

People are going to do whatever they please with them. If some other activity isn't compatible, then it's that activity we'll have to restrict.

Great, you want every asshole with an RC drone to have unlimited freedom to burden/violate others.

Re:If a thing is dangerous with drones...

[Rix]

What I want doesn't matter one whit. Every asshole is going to have that freedom because there's nothing that can be done about it.

Definitely Dangerous

[roger10-4]

While it was cool, I can see how this could be considered dangerous. I don't know much about fireworks, but I can imagine that a collision between a UAV and the firework itself could potentially alter the trajectory of the firework leading it to go somewhere it shouldn't. You get enough senseless idiots flying these things around pyrotechnics, something bad will eventually happen.

Re:Definitely Dangerous

[Rich0]

I'd say there is a far greater risk of the firework itself having a failure that sends it somewhere unintended, though even that wasn't much of a risk here.

This is a fireworks display over water. The firework round has a certain total amount of energy available to it determined by the amount of propellant inside. The launchers were probably located far enough from crowds that even under the most unfavorable conditions a round could not have hit anybody - that is if the firework were directly aimed at the crowd. A shot deflecting off a UAV will not travel farther than that - just physics.

Maybe if they're launching shells right over a crowd a deflection would cause a problem, but so would a short round.

Re:Definitely Dangerous

[Anonymous Coward]

Professional fireworks are big, solid mortar shells that will just smash through a quadcopter like it wasn't even there. The big risk is that something takes out one of the copter's rotors, sending it into a powered fall in an unpredictable direction.

Pilots View in WWII over Germany

[BoRegardless]

Though not as colorful, you can now imagine what it was like for a pilot and copilot doing raids in WWII. Scaaaary!

Re:Pilots View in WWII over Germany

[Koyaanisqatsi]

My thoughts exactly when seeing this. Scary. Awesome too :-)

Re:Pilots View in WWII over Germany

[RivenAleem]

Well of course it wasn't as colourful in WWII, they only had black and white back then, you insensitive clod!

Two boxes for a dollar. $3 / shell. Half price by

[raymorris]

The poppers which aren't regulated as regular firework, go for about 50 cents to $1 per box. I don't recall how many are in a box, maybe 25.

The better consumer fireworks are 2" shells and sell for about $18 for a box of six. 500 gram cakes are about $60. These are all Texas prices, near the import port at Houston. Hazmat shipping to other parts of the country may increase retail prices elsewhere.

Enthusiasts who spend $300 or more can pay 60% less by joining a group to buy at wholesale prices.

What with all the other debris?

[robbak]

The area under a fireworks show already gets peppered with the remains of all the exploded shells. A little added debris from a drone struck by part of the fireworks would make no difference. They always make sure that the fallout zone is in a safe area.

Add to that that the shells are mortar-fired, not rockets, and the risk of this is practically nil. Way less than the risks of just using and handling all that explosive.

Every professional fireworks show - at least, all those that are televised - should include shots from a drone up there amongst it all. The spectacular pictures are well worth the tiny risk.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[anubi]

I think what he was getting at is a firework intercepting a quadcopter will revector its trajectory.

Someone had already planned every path the fireworks were to take, so the spent shells would not land at the wrong place.

However, having hit a quadcopter, a live firework, its payload yet to be spent, could have its trajectory revectored to a viewing area, with likely tragic consequences.

Someone designed that thing to go off a hundred feet up, not spuzzing around under the seats of the audience because it hit something on the way up.

I am sure the safety of the quadcopter was the least of their worries... it is that deflected live firework that I would be worried about.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[fyngyrz]

This. It was stupid.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[sjames]

They are unpowered shells shot from a mortar, not rockets. If they hit the copter (unlikely), they will explode lower than planned, but still well up there and over the water. Considering that the copter was flying around their planned burst altitude anyway, it is likely that only the pilot would notice the collision.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[lgw]

Sometimes fireworks go off early. Sometimes they go off in the launcher. Shit happens, which is why professional fireworks shows aren't cheap: they take mishaps into account when planning safety. The mortar shells won't go farther after slamming into an obstruction.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[Zenin]

Extremely unlikely bordering on impossible.

Nearly every possible failure condition would result in the quad-copter falling more or less straight down and into the water.

These things do not glide. Even a partial motor failure would send it tumbling end over end...more or less straight down. When they fail they fall out of the sky like a rock.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[Opportunist]

Sorry, but nope. Even that had to be taken into account when accounting for the safety zone.

These fireworks are shot up from mortars. Essentially a tube with a ball (the "payload") and a propelling charge underneath. The safety zone must account for misfires of all kinds, including propelling charges that are too weak to hurl the payload far enough. Which is, essentially, what would happen when it hits something on its way.

If that now happened, i.e. if the "ball" hit the quad, what would have happened is that it either cracked due to the impact (NOT exploded, these things don't have contact fuses...), the quad tumbling down out of control and hitting the ground eventually with the fireworks ball falling apart and not becoming a nice star. Or, if it happened JUST at the moment of detonation of the charge, part of the explosives would have hit the quad (there is no "shell" to speak of, so it's kinda unlikely that something solid would hit the quad) and probably made it crash.

Under no circumstances I could possibly imagine this could have led to fireworks "spuzzing around under the the seats of the audience".

Re:What with all the other debris?

[g1powermac]

I agree as I actually seen an almost pretty bad accident this 4th with amateur fireworks. Since it's legal to shoot off amateur mortars in this state, at least half the households here were shooting them off this year. The neighbor behind us had something go wrong and the mortar went a partially curved trajectory and ended up hitting a power line which caused it to redirect straight for where my other neighbor was shooting his fireworks off. Of course it exploded when it hit the ground and if he was there at that time, it would have been pretty bad.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[Anonymous Coward]

What happens if it hits a bird or a balloon / kite drifting in the wind?

Same thing as hitting this device, I presume.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[Anonymous Coward]

So your point is "amateurs firing off fireworks can be dangerous"....News at 11.

Has nothing to do with quadcopters flying through professional fireworks with established safety zones.

Re:What with all the other debris?

[countach]

If that was true, then birds would be a dire hazard.

Heavy solid shell, light fragile drone.

[robbak]

The shell smashes the drone into tiny bits of confetti, and continues on it's merry way. Or, more likely the shell snaps off a rotor arm without noticing.

They will not bounce off each other like billiard balls. That's what happens when you have a collision between equal mass objects in which kinetic energy is conserved. This would be a collision between different mass objects where energy is lost to work - destroying the drone. The one with the most momentum wins.

What he wants versus what is the reality.

[robbak]

The drone genie is out of the bottle. This is the world we not live in - where the possibility of a cheap RC craft being in a particular airspace has to be taken into account.

Re:What he wants versus what is the reality.

[Bing Tsher E]

Lasers are 'out of the bottle' too. What 'cool' things do you suggest I do with my 35 milliwatt laster? No, I'm not really interested in doing it, whatever stupid notion you have of adventure.

I can see how you could think it dangerous.

[robbak]

But I can also apply physics and see how the danger is very small.

The biggest point is that the sky is big and both the shells and the drone are small. The chance of the two coming into contact is negligible. The risk of anything bad happening if that happens is also very small - the only thing I can see happening is if a rotor happens to cut the shell's fuse. The shell is too heavy for a fragile drone to have much effect on it.

Re:I can see how you could think it dangerous.

[roger10-4]

The other comments pointing out that the shells are launched from a minimum safe distance to prevent the shells from making it into a populated area are good points - and I agree with those (except perhaps the operators themselves) . However, applying statistics is a little off the mark I think. The alignment of a few unlikely events is usually what causes unexpected accidents.

already illegal for that.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

In twenty-four hours this will go from "illegal" to "high demand professional camera service" for promotions, events, etc.

Sorry, that's already illegal (according to the FAA).

Just a few weeks ago the FAA issued an interpretation of existing rules that declared illegal any commercial use of video from a drone.

Video is fake

[Anonymous Coward]

The images are far too stable to be taken from a drone flying through explosions. The shells for fireworks are several times the size of the mortars used by the military.

There is no camera shake and views from the drone upside down, which should have happened for a a small copter flying amongst these explosions.

Re:Video is fake

[naughtynaughty]

There is a nice video out there of a quadcopter that loses control and flips. But because it uses a stabilized camera mount the picture is still perfectly oriented with the horizon all the way to the ground, while the quadcopter is all over the place. That you don't understand something doesn't make it a fake. No reason to even get into the silliness of assuming that there is some massive shock wave that would have flipped the copter over.

Re:Video is fake

[ZosX]

The camera is stabilized. At one point the copter tilts enough that part of it is in the frame.

Re:Video is fake

[ChrisMaple]

The video was obviously edited. Bad or boring parts didn't make it to the final cut.

Awesome, but annoying

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

The Fisheye distortion is insanely annoying. If you are going to use fisheye lens, don't pan the camera like crazy. Who the hell does several 360s in a row with a fisheye? Insanely annoying distortion ...

Re:GoPro

[Runaway1956]

I suggest that you visit Youtube, and do a search for Isle of Man TT. There are a lot of videos, and the very best are shot from helicopters. The second best are shot from beside the roadway, by professionals. Onboard video shot with GoPros are decidedly lesser quality in most cases, but the are still better quality than professional equipment was when I was a child. All that quality, packed into a unit easily mounted on a person's head, or on the forks of a motorcycle.

GoPros are damned good!

Be Grateful...

[Thumper_SVX]

Hey, I look on the bright side; even if it's illegal and dangerous at least the person responsible didn't use "Sail" by AWOLNation like every other GoPro video uses. So it appears they at least have some taste.

Too bad...

[PNutts]

He didn't get a shot of the ice helicopter shattering at the end.

Pilots View in WWII over Germany

[Anonymous Coward]

It also reminded me of the scenes in Starship Troopers where ships are targeted by blue plasma :)

Re:"goosebumps every time"

[retchdog]

christ i hate chihuahuas. a yapping pestilence second only to mosquitoes, and they can't even pick crops for subsistence wages. useless.

if every American would just kick one to death, they'd be gone in a few days. problem solved.

Re:You advertising firecrackers now too?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm going to shoot a fuck-load of bottle rockets at your HOSTS file and pretty soon DoubleClick will show up and kidnap you and force you to watch ads 25 hours a day 366 days a year (367 days on leap years).

Its not illegal but...

[Skuld-Chan]

Lately the media have latched onto anything drone related and put it in a bad light - and while I think the video is awesome (I'd love to do one myself!) - the media is yet again putting this in a bad light - driving the FAA further to action. I suspect too that if the pyro-technicians/firefighters below knew he was up there they would have stopped the show.

And when these "media controversies" come out its its always the DJI Phantom. When I first got into making model aircraft - the DJI kits were top notch - they didn't make pre-made aircraft like they do now. I think the process of building them from scratch, and working with the local model aircraft club taught you a certain amount of respect and safety for the devices themselves. Right now I can go down to a hobby shop - plunk down $1200 dollars and be flying within 30 minutes or less without any prior experience flying a model aircraft - quadcopters are deceptively simple to fly and lead inexperienced pilots to take risks others might not.

Lets face it though - the amount of views he's received has paid for this phantom setup - so the only risk was getting the video back off the gopro device.

Re:Zzzzzzz

[kwbauer]

At least fireworks are a better excuse for goose bumps than Obama but that was tingles so maybe it was different.

Been done a few times before

[Anonymous Coward]

Somehow everything becomes news once it's done with the closed-source DJI Phantom -- the quad made for hovering, not flying. If you've followed any of the other flight controller projects you'd at least have seen two of these videos, both at their time ridiculed for disregard for safety.

This one is from ~a year ago http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tC2kgl1yoe0, the other one some 6 months ago had nicer postprocessing and was somewhere on vimeo. Searching vimeo gives a few more results too.

Why drone doesn't shake ?

[sseymour1978]

<tt>Big firework explosions can be clearly felt on the ground.<br>Shouldn't drone be shaking whenever big explosion happens right next to it ?</tt>

Context ffs

[MrKaos]

Not all jet aircraft have multiple engines.

The context here is a commercial jet aircraft - that is what we are talking about. If your single jet aircraft goes down and kill 3 people it barely makes the news. Loose a commercial Jet airliner and everybody wants to know why, because more than 3 people die.

Re:Context ffs

[Runaway1956]

The discussion seemed to me to involve the concept of destroying an aircraft with a quadracopter. The idea was pooh-poohed because jets have multiple engines. I proved that not all jets have multiple engines.

If someone were intent on destroying an aircraft, why would he necessarily restrict himself to large commercial aircraft? I could easily set up a command post near an airport, put my copter in the air, and wait for a single engine craft to make a flyby, or try to land. If I'm really good, and really lucky, I crash the small jet, and it goes into another, larger jet, or into a fuel depot, or even into the boarding lobbies.

OR, I can hover around, waiting for an aircraft to take off, and nail it when it is pointed in the direction of a downtown area. Even a small jet can cause considerable damage if it crashes into a high rise office building.

OR, I can hang around a military base, and crash a jet taking off, bringing it down in rush hour traffic, similar to what happened outside Oceania Airbase in Virginia several years ago.

In the hands of an imaginative terrorist who thinks outside the box, this could be a very useful tool.

Re:Context

[MrKaos]

Fair enough, the original context was: Until some moron flys one into the path of a commercial airliner, small plane, or helicopter, and people die so the context change you introduced was not invalid, just confusing. I get where you are coming from and that would be bad too.

Three words...

[Patchw0rk F0g]

Holy. Fucking. Shit. ;-D

AGAIN with the guns!

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean seriously dude, how far do you have your AR15 shoved up your ass? Did you knock some teeth out with the flash suppressor? You can't go a single fucking story without posting about your goddamned guns. You're as bad a typical burnout stoner constantly talking about weed. Just shut the fuck up already!