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Bold Eagles: Angry Birds Are Ripping $80,000 Drones Out of the Sky (cetusnews.com)
schwit1 found this story in the Wall Street Journal:
Daniel Parfitt thought he'd found the perfect drone for a two-day mapping job in a remote patch of the Australian Outback. The roughly $80,000 machine had a wingspan of 7 feet and resembled a stealth bomber. There was just one problem. His machine raised the hackles of one prominent local resident: a wedge-tailed eagle. Swooping down from above, the eagle used its talons to punch a hole in the carbon fiber and Kevlar fuselage of Mr. Parfitt's drone, which lost control and plummeted to the ground... "It ended up being a pile of splinters"...
These highly territorial raptors, which eat kangaroos, have no interest in yielding their apex-predator status to the increasing number of drones flying around the bush. They've even been known to harass the occasional human in a hang glider... Camouflage techniques, like putting fake eyes on the drones, don't appear to be fully effective, and some pilots have even considered arming drones with pepper spray or noise devices to ward off eagles.
One mining survey superintendent said he's now lost 12 different drones to eagle attacks, costing his employer $210,000. Another drone was actually attacked by nine different eagles, and its pilot estimates eagles are now attacking 20% of all drone flights in rural Australia.
These highly territorial raptors, which eat kangaroos, have no interest in yielding their apex-predator status to the increasing number of drones flying around the bush. They've even been known to harass the occasional human in a hang glider... Camouflage techniques, like putting fake eyes on the drones, don't appear to be fully effective, and some pilots have even considered arming drones with pepper spray or noise devices to ward off eagles.
One mining survey superintendent said he's now lost 12 different drones to eagle attacks, costing his employer $210,000. Another drone was actually attacked by nine different eagles, and its pilot estimates eagles are now attacking 20% of all drone flights in rural Australia.
Nature has decided. No, you can't fucking pepper spray an eagle. Give it up.
See subject line
and they know it. They are defending their position as the master of the sky, deadliest flying living creature.
They are smart and cunning and strong. They use their ability to fly high to develop a ton of momentum and tear apart their prey.
Pretty hard to defend against them, they won't back down.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
Do we need further reminders that everything in Australia wants to kill you?
I hope the eagles knock each and every one of these machines out of the sky. I hope it ends up costing these companies millions, and there's not a fucking thing they're going to be able to do about it. Drone operators/owners are some of the most selfish, self-entitled assholes around, and every time one of them loses one of their drones, I cheer. Good riddance.
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Then map the area in a way that doesn’t fuck with the wildlife. Otherwise, boo-fucking-hoo that the pissed off eagles are downing your drones. These people deserve nothing but crocodile tears.
The machine ... resembled a stealth bomber.
Tragically, though flying in broad daylight, it was not escorted by a protective formation of fighter drones, making it an easy pick for the latest Talon strike fighters of the austral Aquiline air force.
Would pepper spray even work on an eagle? Birds can't taste capsaicin; if anything, it's numbing to them.
It's interesting to see how territorial these birds are. You can find lots of videos on Youtube of them doing things like attacking ultralights and such. I think they're simply going to have to "eagleproof" their drones. Which unfortunately will make them need to be bigger (and more expensive) for a given-sized payload, since a greater chunk of the mass fraction will need to go into structure.
All we want to do is eat your brains.
to fool Mother Nature.
Hands up if you're old enough to remember that TV commercial!
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
wedge-tailed eagles strike at speed with incredible power as they rely on this to stun/kill, they are also very large birds which can weigh up to around 6kg and while the rotors may do some damage the drone will still be destroyed by the impact. They are also a protected species
I think they're simply going to have to "eagleproof" their drones. Which unfortunately will make them need to be bigger (and more expensive) for a given-sized payload, since a greater chunk of the mass fraction will need to go into structure.
Or they could just make drones that don't look like pigs - then the angry birds would stop attacking.
#DeleteChrome
After the double bird strike put Sully in the east river, a shocking number of birds were killed in response.
All the wildlife there is out to kill you.
Best of all, these eagles are listed as endangered and are protected by Australian law. In fact IIRC, the sections of the law that pertain to endangered species impose a "strict liability" standard on actions that injure a member of that species. That means you don't even have to intend to inure one of these eagles. Just being careless can get you serious prison time.
So pretty much those drone operators have to suck it up.
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Nothing a 10 gauge goose gun can't fix.
It's a protected species. Hope you like spending time in jail.
When you are talking about large tracts of land there are plenty of legitimate non-dildastic uses for drones. I doubt someone flying an 80k machine is a drone enthusiast.
love is just extroverted narcissism
We're talking about Australian Wedge-Tailed Eagles, not the American bald eagle (which is basically a glorified seagull).
Ho! Haha! Guard! Turn! Parry! Dodge! Spin! Ha! Thrust!
You're going to need a bigger drone.
The Problem: Drone flies in a manner the that the Eagles think is either prey or competitor. Solution: Find a flying creature they don't attack - Most likely a vulture(everybody thinks vultures are icky, even other birds) - and imitate it's flight
OP is correct that birds are immune to capsaicin (the chemical in hot peppers which makes them "hot"). Speculation is that pepper plants use the chemical as a way to discourage land mammals from eating their fruits, thus guaranteeing their seeds would be dispersed more widely by birds. Pepper spray isn't going to do squat.
Go shooting protected birds in Australia, and you'll be lucky if the cops get you before the locals do. Most australians consider poaching somewhere between pedophilia and keeping dead hookers in the basement. When I worked at the department of parks, we'd have to think very hard over what info we'd release on animal abuse prosecutions, becuase people would react so angily that vigilantism was a real possibility.
Excuse the Unicode crap in my posts. That's an apostrophe, and slashdot is busted.
Worried about the eagles? Mining companies generally do surveys not to enhance a species' habitat but to destroy it. Oh, we're not allowed to harm eagles? NP, we'll just mine the shit out of their territory, and they can sustain themselves by preying on the leftover boulders. Yummy!