Drone Makers Add Geofencing To Keep Drones Out of Restricted Airspace (roboticstrends.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Two of the biggest drone manufacturers, DJI and 3D Robotics, are adding geofencing systems to their products to keep them out of restricted airspace. DJI's Geospatial Environment Online will be available on current versions of the Phantom, Inspire and Matrice drones, providing updated data on restricted flight zones due to regulation or safety concerns, including forest fires, major stadium events, VIP travel and other circumstances. GEO will also include restrictions around areas such as prisons, power plants and more. GEO, by default, will not allow DJI drones to fly in restricted areas. However, DJI is allowing its users to "temporarily unlock or self-authorize" flights in some locations. 3D Robotics will add the safety information software to its Solo smart drone app, containing basic information about federal guidelines (stay five miles from an airport, for example), national parks, airbases and more.

Comments

Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

Last I checked, "restricted airspace" for drones included some hilariously large areas - check out what appears to be the official map. Note that includes five miles from airports (why I can't legally fly drones at my own house) and anywhere in a national park.

Re:Oh, goody

[mwvdlee]

I get airports (though the 5 mile radius may be debateable), but national parks... surely that's just commercial interrests?

Re:Oh, goody

[Opportunist]

But we can maybe agree that it might be a good idea to not fly around like an idiot near airports?

Re: Oh, goody

[WarJolt]

You have as much right to use airspace as you have a right to a public road. You just have to follow the rules. The FFAs primary concern is to make sure the airspace is safe for everyone, so ya they can restrict its use.

You can fly a drone near an airport if you contact the tower first. Class C airspace typically goes to the ground near airport. The typical requirement for aircraft is you must be in 2 way communication with the tower.

I do believe that the requirement for commercial drone flight is a bit to harsh. You currently need to hold a private pilot certificate. The intent is if you're already a pilot they know you can read a chart and follow the rules. Additionally you need to file a section 333 exemption and wait 4 months to give you the same boiler plate exemption they are giving to everyone else. Really this is a temporary measure thats is probably going to take far too long. The exemption that they give comes with restrictions that pretty clearly spells out what they view the requirements should be.

On the other hand non commercial use is a bit too permissive. You should at least have to pass a simple training course, so you at least know what not to do.

If you contact the airport before flight you can fly in your back yard near and airport as a "hobbiest".

Re: Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is idiots flying their toys around forest fires wanting a good view of the flames. Nevermind that the helicopters trying to extinguish said flames can't maneuver around them.

Allow people to fly their drones in parks, but program an override that responds to an emergency reaponse vehicle's beacon to make way.

There's obviously ways that *this* system could also be abused, in theory. I'll let people smarter than I find another solution /happy medium, I guess.

Re:Oh, goody

[fremsley471]

Nope, it's for the visitors to the park to enjoy the peace and quiet. I'd be happy to let planes fly over, as soon as the planes carry enough sound-proofing to make them inaudible from the ground.

Last time we were in Sequoia National Park, we climbed Moro Rock. Apart from our fellow tourists, the only sounds were natural. As we stood on the top, a couple military jet fighters flew west-east at very high altitude (guesstimate FL300) and they were still intrusively audible.

Imagine if the yahoos in small private planes were allowed to buzz around the parks? "Let's go circle General Sherman. Look, it's that one! Not that one, that one. No, that one. I'll go around again. It's that one. That one. No, that's General Grant, it's that one! I'll go around again..."

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

But this restricts you from flying it inside your home, or below your fence line, or letting you contact the airport and get permission to fly, and probably disables the drone when it can't get a GPS signal.

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy fuck! How many airports does America need?!

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

It is also 3 dimensional, pity your thinking is 2 dimensional.

Re:Oh, goody

[Opportunist]

Yup. Say thanks to those that didn't turn on their brain before turning on their drone and did not fly just inside their fence and at eye level. "There is no law against it, so I can do what I want".

Well. Now we got a law. I hope these idiots are happy now. The solution to those people not thinking for a moment and applying moderation where it would have been sane means that it's now being taken away from us.

Maybe if we did that to our kids again we, as a society, may instill that responsibility again. The older ones here may remember how it was when we were young. We got to play and the rules were, well, vague. But there were some "general" rules that we did have to consider, and at least my parents required me to use common sense when pondering whether something was or was not allowed. And "but you didn't say I can't do that" was not really a suitable excuse when I did something really stupid that I should have known better. And, in turn, if I could not play sensibly with something, it was taken away from me.

Pretty much what happens now. I guess if people fail to learn as kids, what they get as adults pretty much has to be a nanny state...

Re:Oh, goody

[gsslay]

The restrictions are there for pretty much the same reason you can't drive your 4x4 SUV where you like in national parks. Because there would always be idiots making a mess, racket and annoyance to ruin the whole point of it being a national park.

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of those (the majority, I'd guess) are small airports that are only capable of small aircraft (think "small prop plane" like a Cessna). Some of them only have one runway. Despite the minimal air traffic and the fact the no one is going to be flying at 100 feet 4 miles from an airport, you're still not allowed to fly a drone within five miles of an airport.

Re:Oh, goody

[fremsley471]

Plutocracy at its best.
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com...

""The passengers who fly on airlines and the airlines are paying for projects at airports where we don't fly," [Air Transport] association CEO James May says"

Re: Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

The regulations on commercial flight are harsh but they're also not law. At this point in time it's not clear whether they can regulate model aircraft at all, let alone ones used in a commercial capacity.

Section 333 exemptions are being used to seek the FAA's blessing for commercial use in advance of actual laws, though this was supposedly not the intended use of the process.

At this point, the only enforcement tool the FAA has is the ability to fine drone pilots for unsafe flight around people and other aircraft. See the Pirker case for details on that as it plays out.

~JB

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

The sound of freedom on high was

intrusively audible

What a sweet sound.

Re:Oh, goody

[tao]

Even some large commercial airports have only one runway. Europe's busiest airport, Heathrow, has only got two runways. So the amount of runways doesn't necessarily give a proper indication of the size of the airport.

Re:Oh, goody

[DancesWithRobots]

Same here. I live on the outer edge of the shadow of Republic airport on Long Island. There is however one thing that should be addressed--airport control zones are shaped like an upside down wedding cake. The closer to the airport you are, the more onerous the HEIGHT restrictions get. The concept of 3d airspace should be addressed by these so called geofences.

Re:Oh, goody

[tompaulco]

Last I checked, "restricted airspace" for drones included some hilariously large areas - check out what appears to be the official map. Note that includes five miles from airports (why I can't legally fly drones at my own house) and anywhere in a national park.

RC Aircraft have flown safely and legally for years at designated areas where those type of vehicles are allowed to fly. Somebody sticks a couple more rotors on an RC aircraft and now somehow people think they ought to be able to fly them anywhere they want?

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

... and anywhere in a national park.

GOOD! Those careless idiots with their selfie sticks were bad enough, last thing we need is annoying little toy helicopters buzzing around us when we're out trying to enjoy the scenery.

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

What is the point of a national park, anyways?

It seems for most people, the point is that it's an anechoic chamber.

I had thought it was to help preserve nature through fostering a human interest in it, but it seems that's the last thing on people's minds. :(

Re: Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

Class C airspace typically goes to the ground near airport.

Yeah, see, I have a problem with that. I don't want to fly my drone where "real" airplanes fly, but if you tell me that you made a rule that forbids me from flying in my back yard because there's an airport a couple of miles from my home, then I'm not going to consider you a reasonable person. If you want your rules to be followed, then don't forbid stuff that isn't putting anyone in danger. A ridiculously low chance that one day some manned glider might clip the forest near my home to come as low as where I am flying and then might collide with my drone before crashing is not a good enough reason to tell me the air that I breathe when I leave my house is restricted air space.

Re:Oh, goody

[myowntrueself]

Pretty much what happens now. I guess if people fail to learn as kids, what they get as adults pretty much has to be a nanny state...

That, actually, is it.

In many cultures (eg the English speaking ones) children are so insulated from the realities of life that they grow up to be, well, children. So they need a nanny state otherwise their civilizations would go Lord of the Flies pretty quickly.

In other cultures children are encouraged to be responsible and reasonable and not indulged, isolated nor insulated. These children grow up to be adults. They don't need a nanny state because they are grownups.

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

Note the "self authorize" on DJI drones. Perhaps read TFA? Oh wait, this is slashdot. Any disruption to "disruptive" tech is an affront to your freedoms. Mind you, if you're flying a drone inside your house or fence line, that's cool. Now, perhaps the best solution is for DJI to make a floor for some of the restrictions, so that you can do limited things, such as go up to 200-300 feet, inside the 5 mile airport restriction, but leave the national park restriction on to the ground. They already have some level of control of the properties of them, it should be relatively trivial to add a height above ground check for those zones, and check it against allowable parameters.

However, these are in reaction to people acting like asshats, and as such, I doubt most of the people pushing this are really sympathetic to a drone owner who feels that this is an imposition on them. You people as a class made your bed, then allowed people to shit in it. Now you get to lie in it.

Re:Oh, goody

[Anonymous Coward]

It's also a place to get away and commune with nature. Leave your damn drones at home.

Re: Oh, goody

[JesseMcDonald]

You have as much right to use airspace as you have a right to a public road.

The biggest problem with that analogy is that public roads are a relatively small space which the government either homesteaded or purchased—perhaps using eminent domain, which is a whole other issue, but at least paying some compensation to the former owner. You can drive however you want on private property (with the consent of the owner), including private roads. But the government claims every bit of above-ground outdoor as "public airspace" under their jurisdiction, leaving nothing for private use.

There should be an explicit exception in the law (not just FAA regulations) for airspace below a reasonable altitude—at least 400 feet, higher in remote areas away from any common flight paths. Some, but not all, of that space will be privately owned; the rest would be available for any non-harmful use by any member of the public without interference from the FAA.

No airport exceptions: if they want that airspace to be clear to ground level they can very well go out and buy it themselves, or negotiate an easement.

Re:Oh, goody

[KGIII]

Comments like this, and the resultant behavior, is why you're gonna end up with draconian restrictions. "Oh but I won't listen to those fuckers!" True, but that's not why they make laws. They make them so they can find and impose harsh penalties. "They can't find me!" Perhaps also true, they need only be lucky once - you need to be lucky every time.

You had options. Instead, you let sexconker, and people similar, speak on your behalf. I dare say, we've had this conversation before. It's unfortunate because I hate to see the government come clamoring down on people who were given a bad reputation by others. This is why you can't have nice things.

Re:Oh, goody

[waTeim]

I think we can agree to try not to be an idiot, but really that's as much as I'm willing to agree to. The problem with arbitrary rules is they are easily gamed or abused. Remember when the Ferguson police got the FAA to declare a no fly zone -- the reason was bullshit of course, but oops too late sorry about that. Lifting the argument up even beyond that, there are legitimate circumstances for the government to restrict behavior and there are other circumstances where they would like to, but shouldn't be able to. That tension is lost when there's no opportunity to mis-behave, and that includes individuals that are not being thoughtful.

Solution seems obvious.

[SuricouRaven]

1. Locate GPS antenna.
2. Stab with pointy object.

Does mean you'll have to pilot it though, not rely on automatic following of a flight path.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[Anonymous Coward]

Or you could just not be retarded. Just kidding, I know that's not an option.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[BlacKSacrificE]

3. Flight computer no longer receiving location data.
4. Drone does not take off.

Even if this is not the current config, it will be once the makers realise this is what people are doing.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[Anonymous Coward]

Or just intercept the GPS co-ord stream, which is often just serial traffic and add an offset in x and y.

Actually I think DJI uses CAN bus, which makes things a bit more difficult.

But still far from impossible

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[dotancohen]

1. Locate GPS antenna. 2. Stab with pointy object.

Does mean you'll have to pilot it though, not rely on automatic following of a flight path.

I pilot (non-robotic) quadcopters, not drones, and let me tell you that without a fair bit of practice a "drone pilot" will do little more than crash his expensive plastic without the robotic positioning. I don't think that the current models even come with a proper transmitter for really controlling the flight, a good transmitter costs more than the flight hardware. The GPS is used for more than navigation, for instance I believe that some devices don't have accelerometers and use the GPS to hold altitude, position, and heading. Wind blows, the weight is not evenly distributed, the four motors are not all equal, and neither are the props.

A good way to work around the restriction would be to intercept the updates. Even if they're encrypted (likely) then simply disabling network access should prevent the "temporary" restrictions such as at sporting events. The "permanent" restrictions, such as those around Washington, DC (not Washington as mentioned in the poor article) and airports will probably require a way to either flash the storage medium via JTAG or decrypt the traffic. I figure the community will take less than a year before it figures out one or the other, based on how quickly other consumer devices are cracked.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[Anonymous Coward]

5. Add GPS faker to the GPS receiver.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[wonkey_monkey]

5. (subject to number 4 being worked around) Drone can't find its way home in an emergency.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[drinkypoo]

I pilot (non-robotic) quadcopters, not drones, and let me tell you that without a fair bit of practice a "drone pilot" will do little more than crash his expensive plastic without the robotic positioning. I don't think that the current models even come with a proper transmitter for really controlling the flight, a good transmitter costs more than the flight hardware. The GPS is used for more than navigation, for instance I believe that some devices don't have accelerometers and use the GPS to hold altitude, position, and heading.

Well, no. The GPS is used for position and speed, if the manufacturer is competent then that's it. You can't get reliable altitude measurements from it, that's where GPS is weakest and most of these tiny antennas are lucky to pull in four sats. A barometer is used for altitude and at least 3DOF sensors are used for flight control. If you want auto-leveling flight, you need 6DOF. You are going to also need a barometer for altitude, though. You can throw in 3 more degrees with a magnetic sensor, which is enough to get absolute orientation. Where the GPS comes in is in position hold, return to home, or waypoint flying. That's the only place the typical drone uses it at all.

For basic self-leveling flight, the only sensors needed are on a 6DOF sensor board, e.g. MPU6050 or similar. That's one chip. For fully controlled flight with RTH and PH you need 7DOF (6DOF plus magnetic heading), Baro, and GPS. Most fancy-pants drones are going to use 9DOF plus baro and GPS. A 3DOF mag sensor is much better than a basic compass, because it can be used in other orientations than flat.

I'm not an expert, but I've built two drones recently (one quad, one fixed-wing) and forked Multiwii so as to add sd card logging support to it...

The "permanent" restrictions, such as those around Washington, DC (not Washington as mentioned in the poor article) and airports will probably require a way to either flash the storage medium via JTAG or decrypt the traffic. I figure the community will take less than a year before it figures out one or the other, based on how quickly other consumer devices are cracked.

I would be shocked and amazed if they were actually doing anything meaningful to keep users out of the device. Probably the biggest impediment to anyone bothering to hack these drones so far is that it's too easy and cheap to just build your own, or to buy a RTF kit that's made out of parts you could have bought yourself and which has no geofencing. Most of the really cheap drones (e.g. with atmega328-based FCs) don't have the room for geofencing code! And even the ones that do have room don't do it, although I can see it coming in the future. It might even be a fun feature to develop.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[ColdWetDog]

Yes, the fences will be hacked apart. Yes, you can bypass everything. And yes, you can fly in a red zone. At least, on a Phantom, just fly without the GPS. You shouldn't go far but puttering around your back yard will be fine.

What these restrictions WILL do is keep the MAJORITY of brain dead idiots (the 15 year olds that get a Phantom for Christmas) from mindlessly flying their new toy anywhere their multitasking-limited brains think is a good spur-of-the-moment idea. If you have enough brains to bypass the fences, either you are a terrorist or somebody you can trust to think past the next 30 seconds.

Think of it as a test.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[dotancohen]

That's also why I see this as a good thing. It raises the bar of getting to the point of doing something dangerous, but doesn't make anything new illegal or stop the really motivated tinkerers.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[dotancohen]

Thanks for the info. Note that I am _not_ talking about the high-end models, the contrary, I am talking about the cost-cutting Chinese manufacturers, such as Eachines. I don't fly the drones, only the piloted quads.

Enjoy your drones, especially the quad! I'm now looking at the page about it that you wrote on your blog.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[drinkypoo]

Enjoy your drones, especially the quad! I'm now looking at the page about it that you wrote on your blog.

I'd enjoy them a lot more if I didn't live right next to an airport! I still don't even know where I can reasonably fly. I've only done very low-altitude flights with the quad, and nothing with the fixed-wing yet. Neither model is set up for FPV yet, so there's no temptation to abuse the airspace anyway.

I wonder how hard it would be to hack the sonar sensor from an "electronic tape measure" to work in my plane. The business end of the circuit appears moderately well-isolated.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[SuricouRaven]

A couple of years ago I was given a packet of 'Chinese Lanterns.' Basically incendiary devices: Paper balloons heated by a candle so they float.

The instructions warned not to launch them near woodlands, fields or urban areas. Or near the coast, near airports, near overhead power lines, near military facilities. I'm not sure where you actually could launch them. Not that anyone follows the instructions.

Re:Solution seems obvious.

[dotancohen]

I'd enjoy them a lot more if I didn't live right next to an airport! I still don't even know where I can reasonably fly.

That's the problem that every city dweller with a telescope has! For the telescope (actually 20x80 binoculars in my case) I try to get out of the city once every few weeks, and occasionally I'll take one of the kids. But don't take kids the first few times that you fly the quad. Those props are really dangerous, go google quadcopter injuries. You might even consider bringing a 1 meter by 1 meter cardboard shield along just in case.

Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[Anonymous Coward]

At some point I expect to hear people whining about "geofencing" in this manner:

"HEY! I bought the thing with my money! I can fly it where ever I like. SO F@#K your geofencing crap."

I think this is only a matter of time.....

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[BlacKSacrificE]

These would be the sort of people I would be happy to see return their drone for a full refund. They are the cancer of the RC community. We have been buzzing plywood around for decades with nowhere near this much trouble, their exclusion from the hobby will be of zero consequence, and a relief to responsible flyers who are being thrown under the bus with the idiots.

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[Opportunist]

Where do I sign?

As an old RC pilot, I get fed up with this kind of people, too. Back when I was young (and the snow was THIS high, even in Summer...), there was no geofencing or anything like that. Oddly, we still didn't fly our planes near airports. Or near hazards. Or near populated land. Or anywhere where simple COMMON SENSE told you that it would be at the very least idiotic, to not use a stronger word, to fly your plane (or helicopter, or whatever) there.

Because people knew what consideration was. People THOUGHT before acting. And people most of all knew that actions have consequences.

But somehow that was lost in the past years somehow. Everyone's entitled to do whatever he pleases and as soon as (not if. Not even when) he fucks up, he blames everyone and their dog, the manufacturer of the gadget that got him into trouble and of course legislation for not protecting him from being a total moron.

Fuck them.

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[scdeimos]

Yeah, because that worked so well for DVDs and region coding.

Re: Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[WarJolt]

I'd like to add that due to public perception and possible regulation things are getting bad.

Ideally there would be more fields where drones are allowed to fly as interest has increased. I was told that one park no longer allows rc planes. Of course this same park also host paragliders and hang gliders, so I'm not sure what the real reason is.

Its really a shame that communities aren't springing up to encourage safe use in safe areas. At least they aren't where I live.

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[BlacKSacrificE]

I think it's much simpler than consideration, its sheer numb mindedness to the potential for disaster and a lack of understanding of aviation and aerodynamics, which anyone who has built a flyer from the ground up has an understanding and respect for. Rather than go on a new rant, let me quote a comment I made on this story last year.

That technology has been available for a few decades.

Yes it has. But there has been a fundamental shift in the accessability of the technology. A majority of this technology has historically been radio transmitters that cost hundreds (sometimes thousands) of dollars, recievers that cost similar, and models that actually require a solid understanding of aerodynamics to build, trim and fly. Dozens if not hundreds of hours of work to build it. An big investment of time, money, and a dash of pride meant that flyers protected their craft like a their first born. Flying near an airfield would be unspeakable; No way in hell do I want my toy wrecked by errant prop or jet wash! (..I guess it would suck if I brought an actual plane down as well.. I guess).

The only thing different about drones is that they are slow and hence easier seen.

I disagree. Any spanner with a credit card and a desire to see their neighbours tits can go buy a ready to fly FPV drone cheap on eBay, hook it up to their smartphone, and get in the air in a second. No expensive equipment investment, no time invested in the build, no incentive to protect their flyer. THIS is the difference, and it has seen people who would never consider an RC aircraft suddenly snapping them up like the "toys" they are often marketed to be. So now you have a bunch of people who have no knowledge about aerodynamics or aviation generally who suddenly think "wouldn't it be sick to go fly this around an airport for lulz and photos", and suddenly we have the problems we are now seeing. Most fixed and rotary wing hobbyists I know have an inherent respect for their fellow flyers, be they scale or full size pilots. We all share the sky, and we'd rather not kill each other. HISTORICALLY there has been close to zero risk (no such thing as zero risk, where there are humans involved, there is always room for something to fuck up) but now the technology is more accessable to the "pleb public", the risks of serious incident is and will continue to increase. As you have said, there have been next to no incidents historically, but as many have pointed out to you, the fact this story even exists to publish is a demonstration that the danger is indeed increasing. To ignore these factors is about as ignorant as using an absolute term like "zero actual risk" when there is no way for you to know what is and has happened globally in the past.. however many years of RC flying as a hobby.

Re: Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[WarJolt]

Interestingly WiFi limits 5GHz channels due to use by weather radar commonly used in airport. If you're using WiFi near an airport, you turned off the country restrictions and your router doesn't do DFS correctly then you may be causing more aviation hazards than the drones. Careful which channels you use.

Re: Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[Opportunist]

It was a long uphill battle for us over here too. Mostly due to hunters fearing that our noisy engines would scare their prey away. At least until we could show footage of a (wild) rabbit sitting and eating only a few feet from a staring RC plane and not giving a shit about the ruckus. They got used to it, noticed that it ain't no threat at all and simply didn't give a shit.

We had to deal with paragliders and we found terms to agree on, we are in contact with the paragliding club that's a few miles away and both sides agreed that we'd inform each other about our activities and what we do when, and so far in the past 2 decades here has not been a single incident or anything coming close to it. It's simply self regulating.

If, and only if, people remember something like common sense and common decency as well as being considerate. This of course falls flat on the face when a feeling of entitlement comes into play. I may do this because $insert_reason. Of course this will be met with resistance. And in no time you have two sides that will go out of their way to make life miserable for the others just to put them down.

And that's when external regulations come in. Which doesn't help diddly squat because then that air of entitlement is enshrined in laws. We may do this because $law. Whether we actually want to do this or not is secondary, but YOU MUST NOT because $law says so. We can inconvenience you for no good reason whatsoever because we're entitled to being allowed to do this.

And that is the bullshit we're in.

And let's face it, the drone operators are not innocent in this either. Because "we may because there is no law against it" led to some drone owners doing inconsiderate things. Flying over settlements. Flying over private property and making people uneasy with the use of cameras. In some cases even endangering people because "there is no law against it so I can do it". Yes, there was no law against it because there was no reason for such a law until very recently. But that doesn't meant that you're allowed to simply shut your brain down, numbnut!

But of course people did, and now we get a ton of bullshit laws as the fallout of these blunders. And these laws now say not only that we can't do what common sense would pretty much say, i.e. don't fly in areas where there are a lot of people, don't fly in areas where there is air traffic, don't fly in areas where there is lot of stuff your drone could be harmed by or that your drone could harm, no, we get laws that pretty much outlaw drones altogether.

Why? Because it's easier to formulate the laws that way. We wouldn't need those laws if people didn't have that air of entitlement and "if there is no explicit law against it, I can do what I want and be a dick".

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[Opportunist]

Yes, that's certainly a consideration as well. All you say is absolutely correct and the conclusions you draw are sound.

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[drinkypoo]

The quadcopter seems to be fundamentally different from the fixed-wing airplane. Either one costs roughly the same, about $200 for a cheap good one RTF. I recently built SK450 for $120 that you'd normally get a basically identical unit RTF for $200, and drone'd up a normally-$200 foam plane (1st gen e-Flite apprentice, sans SAFE... got acrotrainer now) that I got as part of a $10 lot of crap for much less, around half that. But although a fixed-wing drone is theoretically cheaper than a quad (my quad has 4x30A ESC and 980kV motor, my plane has 1x30A ESC and 890kV motor, IIRC — and the quad is made out of high-impact plastic, but the plane is basically made entirely out of stuff inferior to the packing material on a high-end laser printer) we really don't seem to see a bunch of people rushing out to fly their foamy trainers onto airports. What is it about quads that seems to lead to abuse? Is it just the hope of actually landing it and getting it back again after acting out?

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[thegarbz]

Back when I was young (and the snow was THIS high, even in Summer...), there was no geofencing or anything like that. Oddly, we still didn't fly our planes near airports. Or near hazards. Or near populated land. Or anywhere where simple COMMON SENSE told you that it would be at the very least idiotic, to not use a stronger word, to fly your plane (or helicopter, or whatever) there.

Oh please. Back when I was young I could carry guns on the plane under the condition they weren't loaded, buy cyanide from pharmacy, and didn't get put on a watch list ever time I bought a bag of fertilizer for the garden.

You must be under the impression that the bad apples are what is causing all your problems rather than a psycho oppressive government dead set on justifying it's own existence by crapping out a certain number of new restrictions per quarter. A few idiot drones are a rounding error for all the problems facing the world but the government needs to look busy on something. Someone would have eventually figured out that your RC plywood can be landed on the white house lawn and we'd be in the same position as we are now, faced with restrictions.

The only real question is why are drones allowed to be sold without a warning that they contain hazardous materials known to cause cancer?

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[idji]

I think you thought before acting because your hobby was expensive and you felt responsible for the RCs you built. Now that they cost nothing and there is no threshold to anything, the idiots are involved. I don't think this has anything to do with "Back when we were young".

Re:Like RF Limits In Wireless Firmware??

[Opportunist]

RC planes cost next to nothing today with them being entirely built in China now. You can get a plane, ready to fly, for a fraction of what they costed 20 years ago. Even ignoring inflation. Still, old RC enthusiasts don't suddenly decide it doesn't matter if they fly them just anywhere. I can't think of a single case where someone who is "serious" about this hobby decided it would be a bright idea to start his latest dirt-cheap Chinaplane down main street. And these are people who can actually control the plane in a way that will most likely not result in an accident.

It's always the people who never had anything in mind with RC flying models and just now jumped on as they got cheap and you can stick cams on them.

Re:Does slashdot have unicode support yet? Let's s

[Anonymous Coward]

English: PILE OF POO

English works it seems. So there seems to be at least support for the ASCII subset.

5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[viking80]

If drones are geofenced to stay 5 miles from airports, all of the bay area is excluded. It is about 30 airports in the area.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see the problem. Class D airspace extends for four nautical miles around airports, so the five statute mile restriction prevents entry into the airport's airspace and adds a pretty small buffer zone. This makes a lot of sense. If there are, indeed, about 30 airports in the Bay Area, there's also a lot of air traffic and the airspace is pretty busy. That makes it less safe for drones to share the airspace with other types of aircraft. Most people don't know that they can't fly a drone out of sight, above 400 feet, or that they're required to see and avoid other aircraft. Besides, if you can actually get permission from an airport, you'll still be able to authorize the flight on the drone software. I'm sorry, but your desire to fly drones in the Bay Area is far less important than the safety of the commercial aircraft flying through there.

Re:5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[Anonymous Coward]

You should be able to fly it around your house, inside and out. A plane shouldn't be below your roof.

Re:5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[drinkypoo]

If there are, indeed, about 30 airports in the Bay Area, there's also a lot of air traffic and the airspace is pretty busy. That makes it less safe for drones to share the airspace with other types of aircraft.

What about the airspace that's non-shared? The space below, in which aircraft aren't permitted to operate? There's no legitimate interest in denying drone use in that space, because airplanes aren't supposed to be there anyway. In practice, they will be there only in an emergency, which means vanishingly rarely. If it doesn't mean that, then those airports should be re-sited someplace they don't constitute a substantial public health risk.

Re:5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[Anonymous Coward]

In practice, they will be there only in an emergency, which means vanishingly rarely.

You've described the way the system was supposed to work. And yet I recall examples like drone near-strikes on firefighting helicopters. If fools are ignoring temporary emergency service restrictions on airspace for some happy snaps of natural disasters, revoking any rights to that entire space to anyone who hasn't been proven and licensed for common sense is pretty reasonable.

Re:5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't like it, then why would you live there? That's kinda the reason I don't live in Syria.

We have a similar problem where I live. A small local airport attracted a high-flutin' society to live next to it, for easy access to NYC. It brought in revenue to the airport, and now the airport has money and wants to expand, but the citizens are fighting back, because it will bring in bigger, noisier planes. Well who the fuck told you to live there in the first place?

That reminds me of the beachfront property owners in California complaining about the smoke from all the beach fires. Screw them. They knew about it when they bought the house.

Re:5 mile radius exclude the entire bay area

[Anonymous Coward]

In practice, they will be there only in an emergency, which means vanishingly rarely. If it doesn't mean that, then those airports should be re-sited someplace they don't constitute a substantial public health risk.

So where would you like to relocate SFO, SJC, OAK??

Relocating them outside the Bay Area per your suggestion will effectively kill off much of the business that makes the Bay Area what it is, a major business hub.

On the other hand, those people in San Francisco looking for apartments might finally achieve their goals since moving the airports will likely move the business which will move many employees and the Bay Area becomes little more than a rent-controlled welfare geography.

Think about what you say very very carefully.

Remember those goofballs in Washington are listening and looking for any reason to screw with the citizens (slaves?) of the USA.

Awesome!

[Anonymous Coward]

They just singled themselves out as a company not to trust or buy drones from.

f-em

Re:Awesome!

[martin-boundary]

On the contrary. I wish them success, so that they can build and sell a beacon I can put in my backyard to fence off my home.

Re:Awesome!

[BlacKSacrificE]

And yet, they just became my manufacturers of choice, because they are actively trying to do something about airspace incursions and in doing so, are opening peoples eyes to the potential dangers ("we are imposing these restrictions because x y z") of flying in close proximity to things they shouldn't.

I'd never give my money to a company that is arming idiots with tools that can interfere with airport operations, drop electrical grids and god knows what else. People will always whinge about being told they can't do something after the event, however if that something is clearly noted at point of sale as a limitation, they have the option of not buying it, or buying it and operating safely. More power to them.

Re:Awesome!

[nnull]

And eventually they're going to be flooded out of the market by Chinese manufacturers. There's already plenty of Chinese drones that are cheaper and work just as good as these expensive western made ones.

Re:Awesome!

[BlacKSacrificE]

Exactly, and this is where legislation comes in.

Bendix cannot sell aviation radio systems unless they are tested and ticketed by the aviation authority of the country in question. So we legislate the same way for drones. A manufacturer must have X Y Z features (with a good mind to making any measures as unhackable as possible, or more realistically, unhackable to 90% of the population) or it is not allowed to be imported or sold in the countries market, period. Buyers do not assume the risk of being caught with unregistered kit, the legislation can be broadcast in such a way that it educates flyers about airspace and separation safety, and if operators are indeed found to be in breach by hacking around measures designed to keep the hobby safe, then 10 tonnes of solid, legislated rape can be dropped on their heads. This also has the effect of encouraging manufacturers to build the systems in and build them well, lest they find they suddenly loose access to a market.

Yes, there will be grey/back imports but again, this is about setting up a workable framework that will be effective 95% of the time.

Re:Awesome!

[SpinyManiac]

TFS mentions two companies. One of them is Chinese (DJI).

I doubt the other Chinese companies can beat them so easily.

Re:Awesome!

[ColdWetDog]

And eventually they're going to be flooded out of the market by Chinese manufacturers. There's already plenty of Chinese drones that are cheaper and work just as good as these expensive western made ones.

DJI is a Chinese company, you insensitive clod.

And this is how the world is going to end

[louic]

If the state keeps taking responsibility from the people we will end up with no one knowing anymore what responsability is. "It is not forbidden so it's OK".

Re:And this is how the world is going to end

[Anonymous Coward]

They have too, after all the people have obviously shown they are not able to be responsible for their own actions.

85km long laser pointers, blinding pilots and more.
Drones, flying high speed and far range near airportrs, if you youtube you can see REAL incidents of RC plane toys actually HITTING a biplane at a RUNWAY. Why? OBVIOUSLY HE WAS RESPONSIBLE.

Re:And this is how the world is going to end

[AHuxley]

Light aircraft and helicopters can continue to offer all the same services they always did without any new digital competition.

You will be surprised

[Anonymous Coward]

what will be classified as "restricted air-space" eventually. Record police violence from above during peaceful protests? Sorry, that part of the park and the unused parking spot have just been classified restricted air-space.

Fencing Private Property?

[rholtzjr]

So when will they produce the ability to "fence" your own property? Range restrictions?
You know I would kinda hate to be the second (or is it the third) person to shoot one of the drones down.

Additional feature

[U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M]

If you fly too close to the White House, your drone will self-destruct after sending the coordinates of the remote to secret service.

I smell a class action lawsuit

[RogueWarrior65]

Just spent over a thousand dollars on a device that doesn't work everywhere. This is no different than the authorities saying that we, as search & rescue personnel, can't drive quads or jeeps or land a helicopter in a designated wilderness area. Oh, excuse me, Mr. On-Scene-TV-Reporter, have I got a story for you.

Re:I smell a class action lawsuit

[Anonymous Coward]

Right, you think a class action suit because the manufacturer implemented restrictions that the FAA largely set in software, rather than trusting pilots to do it. That will go far. Not to mention that DJI at least lets you over-ride it, although it probably logs that, so that when people do stupid shit in contravention of these restrictions, the pilot is show to be willfully and actively flouting airspace restrictions, and thus clearing the manufacturer of more of the liability.

Not to mention that hey, guess what, if you're using a consumer drone for search and rescue, then you probably haven't got a good platform. There are drones designed for that that carry things like thermal imaging gear, better comm equipment, radio beacons, ETC. You think a shitty webcam, essentially, will find someone from the air? Seriously, what is it with drone owners? You appear to think your off the shelf stuff is a lot more useful than the toy it really is, and find a bloody over-ride setting to be too large of a barrier to using it. I tell you, I have to remember multiple magic numbers to find over-rides on machines, and then set and confirm them every day, in order to do setup on machine tools. You are complaining that in order to play with a TOY, you have to accept that you are doing it in contravention of airspace restrictions in potentia, and override a setting designed not just for your safety, but for the safety of those around you, and for obedience with laws. If you were doing SAR, which I sincerly doubt, would you want dozens of little crappy drones flying around when you've got a copter in the air? Either they go down, or your copter does, if something goes wrong. Consumer drones are not designed for those downdrafts, nor should they be. You get a max of 5KM of controllable range, in the US. Now, that goes down when you have interference, like say, WI-FI, trees, rain, or hills. In ideal conditions, you can cover an almost reasonable amount of area, but your flight time is stuck at 20 minutes, meaning you can cover, at the 16M/s of the DJI Phantom 3 pro, about a 15 kilometer moved distance search pattern. That's going flat out, and assuming you keep some power in reserve to RTB. You then have to scan that, at speed, with a 720P webcam, which moves half a meter between frames. You can't really do usable SAR with that platform. You need better imaging, more power, and perhaps a radio beacon so once you find it, helicopters can come and help people easily. Would also make recovering the damned things if they failed easier, and allow them to be visible on ATC radar. So that incident coordinators can keep track of where your area of operations is, and keep other stupid people from interfering.

Please, try for a class action suit. I will laugh when you essentially self-incriminate yourself, and members of your class, by effectively admitting you're violating restricted airspace. But I doubt any lawyer would take it up. They don't like clients having to pay money to the federal government, as that both makes them look bad, and means you have less money to give you.

Not new News is it?

[pedz]

My Inspire has had this for several months now. Why is this just now making it as "news"?

So, what's your point?

[Anonymous Coward]

If drones are geofenced to stay 5 miles from airports, all of the bay area is excluded. It is about 30 airports in the area.

Not sure what your point is. Are you being forced to live there?

On another note, is there a way to install a geofence around my yard?

Obvious

[Anonymous Coward]

The answer is patently obvious. Quadcopters are vastly superior to all other RC craft. They are stupid simple to fly, insanely stable, have safety features like automated return to home for low battery or loss of signal, and can be easily and safely flown in vastly more restricted space. This makes them much more popular and desirable to a much bigger audience than your foamie, ironically called park flyer[sic].

Your park flyer requires skill, practice a HUGE open area, a take off/landing field, has no safety net, is easy to lose control of, or just plain lose/crash and cause damage/injury...

Contrary to the knee jerking around here, quad copters require virtually no take off or landing space, can be safely flown indoors or out in tight quarters, by anyone from preteens to 98 year olds that have never seen one before, are SUPER reliable... They are also rarely if ever used for the number one reason for their vilification, lack of privacy/spying.

Quite literally, the entire controversy is manufactured. It is figment of mass hysteria.

Faraday cage anyone?

[Anonymous Coward]

So what happens if the flight controller can't get a gps signal? Is it unable to take off? If so, then a small piece of foil over the GPS receiver would be all that's needed.

Re:OMG You Must Be One Old Fucker

[Anonymous Coward]

Your entire rant sounds exactly like the elitist antisocial and clueless ranting of some old codger retiree.

Nobody cares about you prejudicial opinion, Grampa. FOAD already.

I see the "moral outrage of the criminally stupid" has now started.

To think those of us that have lived many years on this planet are entrusting the future of this civilization to ID10Ts like this.

It makes you think that lions have got the right idea about killing their young.....

Hmmm.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not a bad idea for the average store bought drones, as people often cause problems without intention. But this will be abused by authorities, so until we get the authorities under control, I am against this.

Build your own, and don't use those chips.

Make it bigger!

[morgauxo]

They should make that restricted area huge! Cover the whole earth except for a little circle around senator feinstein's house. Make them all fly there!