NYC view from RC plane

[mikester]

Originally Posted by slodave

I'm an FPV'er. I have not followed the rules in the last 6 months, but a lot was still unwritten and just guidelines. I do know that you do have to be careful, especially with bigger planes. My telemetry is in a 3 meter glider and by the time batteries and lead goes in, it does get a bit heavy and could be quite the lawn dart if something happens while tooling around at 3,000' MSL.

I hope UAV's and the like are not banned. It would be a shame. I think the jets are more of a problem. At least two crash and start fires at the basin every year.

It's actually probably more than that. My personal opinion is that Jets should not be flown at the Basin. We have had to cancel a few Jet specific events due to conflicts with other events and the club tries to be very aware of what other events are going on on weekends where a big jet event is happening. The club plans the event schedule in October of the previous year and approves it by December or January. We work with Parks and Recs to make sure we aren't conflicting with any big festivals and if we do - we move things. If we find out that some big event is going to happen after we have already finalized our schedule - the Jet event might be canceled - it has happened, in fact I think it happened last weekend but I'm not sure of all the details. Our 'Jet director' on the board for the club quit this year after a crash that caused a small fire and endangered some folks at a park across the street from the field. To be honest though, while it was a jet - it could have been ANY airplane including your lawn dart (or my own). My supposition is that his departure was directly related to that incident - it spooked him.

Dave - I don't want to be too critical of you personally - but I have expressed my opinion. I am not perfectly safe myself but I try to be reasonable. I know a guy down here in the south bay that flies his easy star up and down the coast with his buddy driving a car and him in the back seat. Sure it's fun and the video is damned cool but it is risky.

What can terrorists do? Well, they can do whatever they want. They don't have to worry about the law do they...

I have thought about that as well and all I can do is be vigilant if I see something way out of whack. I don't even know what that might be...I guess I will when I see it. I do think that this renegade FPV stuff sure seems close to it though.

My point mainly is that it is risky to the hobby and people just don't seem to get that. They thing 'hey, I'm just having a good time' and they don't see that it takes our accident prone models and takes them out of our usually kind of controlled environments and puts them out there in the wide open national airspace. It's just irresponsible. Do it at the field, fly around the field, keep it safe and as controlled as possible or take it out to the desert. Stay under 400' and use a spotter or two to keep track of the airspace.

[slodave]

Mike,

I understand. My glider would be hard pressed to catch anything on fire, since it carries not fuel, but if I have the video gear in it, that means a Li-Po is in it too and that could burst. The other batteries are NiMh I'm not too worried about them catching fire.

As far as the 400' rule, that really seems to be in effect around real airports, like VNY, which the Apollo filed is very close to. I have yet to see an actual rule created by the FAA or AMA that dictates that I need to stay at or below 400' if I am 5 miles+ from the nearest airport. Since I fly at Pierce, I am out of that circle. As far as distance, our club was really into setting records, but everything was done in the desert, away from the general population.

The 400' rule is also why you don't see me at the basin. It's just no fun at the altitude. When I am not flying FPV, I enjoy trying to set altitude records (unofficial).

As far as using RC planes as guided missiles, naw.... I can't see that happening.

The A, B and C are waypoints, so yes, i could program in a buildings coordinates and it would be easy to remotely fly to it and...

I have so much info available to me with my telemetry, it's just too easy to do.

[mikester]

The 400' rule is an FAA rule for the entirety of the national air space - I have seen the rule but I'm not sure where to look for it and I'm studying for some test for work right now so I can't take the time to look for it.

I'll ask someone I know who works for the FAA though...I could be wrong.

[slodave]

As of last year, the FAA had no rule about this and I still don't think there is. There is a guideline under one of the AC's to stay below 400', but it's not a rule or law. That's not to say things have changed in 2010. I was actively reading the discussions about all this on rcgroups last year and the beginning of this year.

EDIT: Here's a link to the pdf on the AMA's website. This was from last year and was the purposed rules. If anything past, it would have been in the last two weeks, as there is a current thread on rcuniverse on this.
http://www.modelaircraft.org/faa/recommendations.pdf

If nothing else, I'll throw a mode C transponder in there, set to 1200.. Problem solved.

FAA AC from 1981:
http://rgl.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgAdvisoryCircular.nsf/0/1acfc3f689769a56862569e70077c9cc/$FILE/ATTBJMAC/ac91-57.pdf

[mikester]

Ah yes, the difference between a rule and a law...

[slodave]

Read the AC, it's voluntary. Yes, rule/law - law just sounds so menacing.