Civilian Use of Drone Aircraft May Soon Fly In the US 196
An anonymous reader sends this excerpt from the Seattle Times:
"Drone aircraft, best known for their role in hunting and destroying terrorist hideouts in Afghanistan and Pakistan, may be coming soon to the skies near you. Police agencies want drones for air support to find runaway criminals. Utility companies expect they can help monitor oil, gas and water pipelines. Farmers believe drones could aid in spraying crops with pesticides. 'It's going to happen,' said Dan Elwell, vice president of civil aviation at the Aerospace Industries Association. 'Now it's about figuring out how to safely assimilate the technology into national airspace.' That's the job of the Federal Aviation Administration, which plans to propose new rules for using small drones in January, a first step toward integrating robotic aircraft into the nation's skyways."
Japan's Robot Overlords (Score:5, Interesting)
http://benpheneverything.wordpress.com/2009/08/19/robotic-crop-dusting-in-japan/ [wordpress.com]
http://www.gizmag.com/go/2440/ [gizmag.com]
Re:drone aircraft used on/against civilians (Score:4, Interesting)
only problem is -they might decide to take out the police -as the members of the Afghan military have done so often against the Alliance
In ancient Rome towards the end they would only allow foreign troops inside Rome to prevent coups and popular uprisings from having a sympathetic or communicative military...
-I'm just sayin'
DIY Drones (Score:5, Interesting)
Civilians are already building their own drones. See DIY Drones [diydrones.com], etc.
Personally I'd like to see a drone airship that can hold a stable position around 70,000 feet (~21km) to use as a WiFi relay, which would fix the problem of getting a clear line-of-sight for point-to-point long-range wireless but good. I doubt it can be done reliably though. But if it could, and you built a fleet of them linked with Open Mesh [open-mesh.com], you could build a global drone communications network for fairly cheap. Call it Skynet... oh.
See and avoid... (Score:4, Interesting)
Drones are both too small to see easily and have no pilot on board that can see any conflicting traffic.
Anyone want to open a pool to bet on how soon a drone gets sucked into a major airliner's jet intake and causes a crash? Yeah, big jets fly really high -- unless they are landing or taking off or approaching an airport. Drones fly really low -- right where the GA small-aircraft fly.
Re:Japan's Robot Overlords (Score:5, Interesting)
Here in the UK, drones have already been used by civilians to survey the masonary of the Stirling Bridge [bbc.co.uk]
The civilian contractors, however, appear to be more adept at handling the technology than Merseyside Police, who forgot to get permission from the Civil Aviation Authority [bbc.co.uk] to use their drone, before crashing it in to the River Mersey [telegraph.co.uk] a year later.
Re:Fourth Amendment (Score:5, Interesting)
I don't know which "thermal imaging" case you're referring to, but I am troubled by police using helicopters to find grow houses using thermal imaging and then getting a warrant to search the place.
Every time there's a new technology it seems the police want to jump on it. Crime levels have been falling. Yet we're spending more money on policing. This is the case in many major cities. Our city wanted to cut back our Fire service so the Cops could get a larger cut. If the police want to fight fires too, be my guest, until then stop invading on our privacy and turning our nice, (relatively) peaceful society into a police state. Its not like any appreciable increase in police or crime fighting technology has or will demonstrably deter or reduce crime.
Really... (Score:5, Interesting)
Government by popularity with a decision making process funded by corporations is an insanely dangerous thing.
No. I will not willingly give a blind government hierarchy a cost effective way to micromanage our lives and to automate the fleecing of the people. WE ARE NOT THEIR SOURCE OF INCOME. They are supposed to be our servants.
Think about this: It is impossible for a government, a corporation, or a committee to be moral. Morality requires a conscience and only an individual can have a conscience.
Re:FT"FTFY"FY (Score:5, Interesting)
That's not just a troll. The drones get much bigger headlines (just outside the USA?) for blowing up wedding parties and other civilians, than for killing enemies, even though they hopefully do the latter more often.
I was going to comment about blowing up allied border posts, but that particular massacre was done by piloted planes. So are drones really the problem?
Are drone pilots any more detached from the carnage than the WWII high-altitude incendiary bomber crews?
As for civilian use, we could use a couple of these for aerial shark patrols. Not too dangerous flying over the ocean. They could even be armed with a .50 cal gun.
Re:I don't see what's to stop... (Score:5, Interesting)
Depending on the size and complexity of the drone, I would wire up an appropriately-sized radio control airplane(or copter) with a camera and a light payload of explosive, probably using a servo instead of electronic signal as the detonator for safety reasons. It would be more expensive than firing off a few rounds, but the fact that the oppressors paid a hundred or even a thousand times more for their drone than I did would be worth it.
Stick with rifles, you'll have a hell of a time hitting it with an RC aircraft and they're more likely to know you did it - with the rifle you can shoot from a concealed location and disappear before they can find you. Either way, gunshots or flying explosive charges around, your're in jail when caught.
Drones (and drone operators) are extremely ill-suited to dealing with level playing fields. But you're right about everything else, though. Guess its time to move to a rural area, growing and hunting all of my food and saving up enough money to flee the country before its military is turned loose against the general population.
Point of the article is that drones are shrinking. Sure, the Predator is the size of a 707, but take a look at Switchblade [avinc.com], smaller than the RC plane you can get at your hobby shop, faster too, not cheaper, but it costs less than your legal fees will trying to deal with the legal charges you'll face for putting RC explosives into the air.
The rural area plan sounds good, but unless you can afford hundreds of acres, it's not much more secure than living in a normal city. And, as for fleeing, to where? Try to take comfort in the fact that we've got less than 1% of our population in the military [wikipedia.org], half of them as reservists, even if the military does consume nearly 5% of our GDP, those numbers have been generally falling from 10% of GDP and more soldiers (in absolute numbers) in 1960.
Re:I don't see what's to stop... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hate to break it to you, but Hobbyist FPV (First Person View) RC pilots have been building and flying planes that are smaller AND faster than that, with greater range.
From the spec sheet:
Size: Unlisted. but from the picture it appears to be roughly 2 feet long, with a 1.5 foot wing span.
Weight: 5kg!! This is VERY heavy for a UAS of this size. Most short range FPV birds clock in less than 4kg, preferably closer to 2 or 3. Long range birds weight more, mostly due to larger batteries.
Speed: 55knots (a bit over 63mph) about average for a UAS of this size, there are MANY very cheap foamy planes in use right now as FPV platforms that will easily crest 100mph. (Stryker, Funjet)
Range: 5KM Again, fairly average for a plane this size. For FPV round trips, that's 2.5km out and back. Many FPV planes can go 5 out and back, 10 out and back and more. So 5km one way isn't impressive.
So it's not faster, not smaller, and yes, not cheaper. Mostly because it's a flying bomb, NOT the type of plane we are likely to see used for reconnaissance. Don't get me wrong, it's a great tool. Just not what you thought it was for.
In truth, the private sector is very far ahead of the military in regards to small UAS craft. Mostly due to hobbyists pursuing it on their own. If you see a drone up in the sky, you can bet it isn't big brother, it's probably your neighbor from down the street.