Posted on 09/27/2014 5:19:22 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Drone Exemptions for Hollywood Pave the Way for Widespread Use
By BROOKS BARNESSEPT. 25, 2014
LOS ANGELES — The commercial use of drones in American skies took a leap forward on Thursday with the help of Hollywood.
The Federal Aviation Administration, responding to applications from seven filmmaking companies and pressure from the Motion Picture Association of America, said six of those companies could use camera-equipped drones on certain movie and television sets. Until now, the F.A.A. has not permitted commercial drone use except for extremely limited circumstances in wilderness areas of Alaska.
Put bluntly, this is the first time that companies in the United States will be able to legally use drones to fly over people.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Being that Hollywood is a branch of the federal government, this makes perfect sense.
Summer, Hollywood starlet mansion swimming pools... yeah baby!
I fear there will be so much political pressure put on the FAA that they will cave in to the hobby folks that we will have hundreds of thousands of these damn things flying everywhere for commercial purposes.
And no, these guys cannot contain themselves and resist using these things in unsafe areas, taking video and pictures of everything and everybody. They will claim they are responsible enough not to but that is BS.
Is our military tooling up drones for medi-vac purposes? These quad rotor ones seem like a perfect “risk free” option for that purpose and I’ve seen nothing about it anywhere?
On Hawaii Five-0 last night, they had drone that sprayed the beach with bullets causing the city to be completely shut down. Just wait until that Hollywood scene becomes real life.
It makes sense to use them for movies and TV although the unions might not be happy about it.
Amazon.com is trying out drone deliveries. A company in Germany is already using delivery drones. Aside from them dropping baby grand pianos on innocent victims and being hacked to different locations and spying on you, what could possibly go wrong?
Amazon essentially told the FAA to go to hell and they would do what they want until there is a “law” against using drones commercially in the US.
Just look at it this way, every pizza joint in your town, every grocery store, convenience store, hamburger joint, sandwich shop, real estate agent, “news” reporter, tv station and hobbyist flying 1,000 of these things over your small little town, all under 500’, all under no air traffic control. Naw, nothing could go wrong.
We shall see if the FAA has the gonads to do what is right or kowtow to the politicians.
There are laws regulating where RC airplanes can and can not fly. Drones shouldn’t be exempt from the same.
Every drone is going to have to have a state-issued transponder/license plate. Like a car. An infrastructure of tracking stations will have to be developed.
Regulators and lawyers will make a fortune.
It seems to me sometimes that every technological advance is a cost to freedom and an advantage to government.
Yep, there are regulations and local laws but these ying-yangs want those lifted and be able to fly for commercial purposes anywhere they like, including your back yard.
I have said for a couple of years now that the real money will be made by somebody that develops a “drone killer”.
“Yessssireeee folks rat chir we got the best drone killer on the market, homes in and knocks down any drone under 500 feet, garrrrrannnnnteed!!!!! Only $29.95 for the base unit with re-loads $5.95 plus shipping and handling.”
The FAA lost the first round in court already. Additionally it has refused to openly engage in rule making on UAVs in the national airspace. What is going on is being slow rolled.
They cannot continue to put their head in the sand or they will simply be bypassed as they are today.
The physics don’t work well for that, but that never stopped Hollywood or those pushing hysteria.
The R/C aircraft community used to have a problem with that some years ago when there were a limited number of frequencies. Remember the guy at the beach who did not like seeing the gliders and would jam them. As I recall the FCC did nothing so some guerilla action was required. Damn near burned the house down.
Kinetic kills are impractical in anything other than rural areas. It would have to be a comms link jam and that cannot be limited to 400 feet AGL. It would not down the drone but would cause it to abort its mission and RTB
Hollywood fantasy today could very well be the reality of the future.
The FAA is currently tasked to develop rules and procedures to allow UAVs to operate in the national airspace. It is dragging its feet and well behind schedule. The Obama administration which forced this is not keeping the FAA’s feet to the fire.
The key issue is see/sense and avoid. The air traffic system is based on pilots seeing other aircraft or hazards and avoiding them. Hard to do on a quad copter. Larger ones can carry sensors, the cheap hobby ones not so much.
And spying through the bedroom window from the back patio.
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