Drones... harmless boy toys or perverts new choice...?

[ian in lancs]

air rifle

[Wallace12R]

Where in the England are you? Could it have been a Police drone?

A few weeks back we had a local man go missing, and we had a Police drone overhead for a short while whilst they were scanning the local woods etc looking for his car.

https://www.surrey.police.uk/news/police-acquire-f...

https://www.surrey.police.uk/about-us/our-equipmen...

[Roofless Toothless]

Why is it that I find the idea of a police drone looking over your garden fence more disturbing than one owned by a pervey neighbour?

[Shakermaker]

I'm definitely of the belief they are "both" having met a few people who own them.

Some are there using them for their photography/film business/hobby.

Some of them just want to be perverts but pretending to be filming for legitimate reasons.

[Wallace12R]

I found it slightly concerning too, apparently they don't actually use them too often. I was out washing our car at the time it was hovering, and my initial thought was "why the fk is someone watching me wash the car?!"

Ive always thought of these drones as being a rather handy tool for potential robbers, on the look out to see who has what size garden shed / garage. The bigger the outbuilding, the bigger the potential 'haul'.

[Puggit]

It's clear that a minority of the great unwashed cannot be trusted with drones, either for privacy reasons or security (flying over football/concerts or airports).

I think we're going to have to go down the root of licensing them so they can be traced

[Shakermaker]

They had to close Gatwick Airport last night for about 10 minutes because of someone with a drone flying it near the runway

[STe_rsv4]

Do you lot honestly believe that your missus is that attractive that someone would be spending upwards of £1000 to take an aerial photo of her from 100 foot up (therefore like taking a phone camera photo from 100 feet away!)?!
most consumer drones (DJI etc) dont have a zoom function on the camera. chances are whoever was flying it was just having a general flyabout and couldnt care less if you were washing your car / rubbing suntan lotion into your wifes back / crotch.

[jmorgan]

Puggit said:

It's clear that a minority of the great unwashed cannot be trusted with drones, either for privacy reasons or security (flying over football/concerts or airports).

I think we're going to have to go down the root of licensing them so they can be traced

I fear this was ever the case but forced by the authorities because of said actions by the feckless. I fancied getting one myself to mess with imaging, some stunning sea sides cliffs type vistas close by and Brecon Beacons not far away. Not sure I want to bother with the bother now.

[300bhp/ton]

TTmonkey said:

Out in the back garden in the sunshine today... the ladies of the house in their bikinis topping up the tan....

And then a high pitched buzzing noise from overhead, and a large drone goes over. Circles back around, goes overhead again. Guess 100 ft over. Does another fly past. Stops. Moves away again.

Never seen or heard one around here before.

So, harmless toy or perverts choice tool for getting a look around the neighbourhood?

You do realise that a quadcopter or multi rotor doesn't have to have a camera on it to fly?

Really it's not "drones" that are the problem, it's the hysterical insecure people like you posting up such utter ballst.

EDIT:

Not meaning to sound harsh and of course having one flying over your house is not really on. Although on a forum people often claim something is flying over them, when in fact it isn't, it's just near by... Not saying this is the case, but you haven't said.

And due to the different types of drone, it really would help if you said what it looked like.

e.g.

was it something like this


Very large with something akin to an SLR sized camera on it?


Or was it more like this:


Or even this:



To actually fly a drone stead enough to clearly see a person in any detail is a challenge in itself. Even more so for smaller hobby grade ones.

And most on board cameras will use fisheye or wide angle lenses. And usually have no zooming ability at all.

Have a look at typical HD video from a quadcopter:
https://youtu.be/ZHYNfMQVw3A?t=3m59s

Edited by 300bhp/ton on Monday 3rd July 09:43

[300bhp/ton]

jurbie said:

Just wait until one brings down a plane,

Yeah just think, radio control aircraft are a completely new idea...

[DIW35]

If the drone was flown within the rules i.e. no closer than 50m from another person, if it was fitted with a camera then any people on the resulting image wouldn't be very big. It's not like they are fitted with a massive superzoom as favoured by the paparazzi for sneaking clandestine shots of people.

[300bhp/ton]

RobDickinson said:

Nickyboy said:

As most drones don't have cameras

What? only the super cheapest smallest toys dont have cameras.

Anything of a reasonable size will certainly have one if not 2...

No it won't FFS, people do post utter rubbish on here.

[300bhp/ton]

paulw123 said:

was some lads flying one up and down the beach last year making very low slow passes over the people sunbathing. lifeguards didn't seem to care. Drones should be licenced IMO.

So what about foam RC planes.... maybe you'd like to license push bikes or footballs too.

[300bhp/ton]

RobDickinson said:

If you are out in public you should have no expectation of privacy.

If you are at home in your garden you should.

Yes and no. Considering most houses have neighbours and most neighbours will be able to clearly see into other people's gardens from their house windows.... then the expectation of full privacy is either folly or limited to those with mansions or living in isolated areas.

[300bhp/ton]

davhill said:

There must be a techie PH-er who can tell us how to jam or override the signals
that control a drone. Better yet, can it be made to home, like a pigeon, on its
own transmitter? At full chat? TeeHee.

That would be far more illegal than flying a drone anywhere. Not too mentioned hugely dangerous. What exact do you think would happen to a drone that loses signal? Or maybe any other device operating on the same set of frequencies in the area?

[300bhp/ton]

mikeveal said:

You may not fly a drone within 50 metres of a person, vessel, vehicle or structure not under the control of the pilot. You may not fly within 150 meters of a congested area. The drone must be within direct line of sight at all times. If the pilot is using a remote camera to control the drone, the rule still applies and he must have a spotter to watch the drone.

You are quoting this out of context.

It's perfectly legal to fly these within 50m of a person or building.

[sc0tt]

300bhp/ton said:

mikeveal said:

You may not fly a drone within 50 metres of a person, vessel, vehicle or structure not under the control of the pilot. You may not fly within 150 meters of a congested area. The drone must be within direct line of sight at all times. If the pilot is using a remote camera to control the drone, the rule still applies and he must have a spotter to watch the drone.

You are quoting this out of context.

It's perfectly legal to fly these within 50m of a person or building.

These, not so much ...

[lucido grigio]

jurbie said:

Just wait until one brings down a plane, someone's been having a go at Gatwick this evening.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40476264

"Expert300" decided to skip past this post........wonder why ?......

[AW111]

I think a directed EMP weapon would be more fun, if you could get say 10m range.