
Colorado Lawmakers Seek to Make Flying Drones Over Wildfires a Felony - mikece
http://www.thedrive.com/tech/21832/colorado-lawmakers-want-to-make-it-a-felony-to-fly-a-drone-over-a-wildfire
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zlynx
It's a good idea, but making it a felony is not.

Is everything going to be a felony these days? Why? It attaches serious long
term consequences, because a FELONY is widely regarded as a crime of direct,
major harm against a person.

Flying a drone that actually causes a collision, sure, maybe that's a felony.
Just getting caught in the area, because the pilot is curious and maybe never
even /heard/ of this law? No, that's not a felony, in my opinion.

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oh_sigh
Ignorance of laws is no excuse, especially when it is laws relating to a
expensive hobby activity that you have.

Would you support drunk driving laws that let drunk drivers who don't injure
anybody off with a small ticket equivalent to a parking ticket, and only those
who injure someone get their license revoked, jail time, etc?

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lovich
On the other hand though, there is no one alive who knows all of the laws in
the US. It is infeasible to be aware of everything and we likely break laws
everyday without knowing it.

Would you support a system where the state can find a reason to arrest you
whenever they feel like, and arbitrarily enforce it against people they don't
like?

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jonhendry18
I don't need to know the laws about distilling alcohol and whatnot, because I
don't distill alcohol.

Knowing all the laws would be difficult. Knowing all the laws _about your
hobby, that apply where you engage in it_ should be simple.

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opwieurposiu
Private water bombers are paid a per-diem, regardless of whether they do any
drops or not. Thus the safest way to make money is pretend you saw a drone.
Aerial operations will shut down and you get your money with zero work and
zero wear and tear on your aircraft.

The vast majority of "Drones" spotted from aircraft are not really drones,
they are birds or plastic bags or a figment of the imagination.

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dreamcompiler
From TFA: "...could potentially become a federal crime"

"Felony" does not equal "Federal Crime" and state lawmakers do not have the
power to make anything a federal crime.

Update: Above is correct, but article implied it is Colorado state lawmakers
proposing this. In fact it is Colorado's _federal_ congresspeople proposing
it, and they are indeed proposing that it be a federal felony.

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lifeisstillgood
I understand the concerns of firefighters and the politicians trying to defend
them but this is a piecemeal patch on something that needs a coherent
response. Of course flying your drone where a fire copter is operating is just
making their lives harder - they don't need a law specifically about
wildfires. They just need a button that says "this ten square miles it off
limits. The transponders that every drone made is now fitted with will tell us
who you are and the fine is in the post"

Drones are a real thing now. We can either require drones to have someone
walking in front carrying a red flag, or we can introduce roads, traffic laws,
police.

The FAA is probably a good place to start, but someday soon every drone needs
to have a registered id number, and to start screaming if it goes out the
globally agreed geofences that are delegated to local administrations.

Basically we can have the aero equivalent of Munich traffic or Mumbai traffic.

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toomuchtodo
This isn’t a bad idea. Give access to firefighters to issue TFRs (temporary
flight restrictions) with an interface to allow them to create the necessary
polygons on a map and feed that into the FAAs flight plan system, while
enabling drones to receive that information rapidly.

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waterphone
This is already standard procedure, wildfires with air operations put
temporary flight restrictions in place as a matter of course, which apply to
drones as well. People still fly drones and shut down operations regularly.

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toomuchtodo
Felonies and shotguns it is then. Can’t argue with simple.

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lifeisstillgood
Fairy Nuff

I think that this is partly training (you get in a real aeroplane you are
drilled to look up flight plan data, weather and restrictions)

But it is also equipment - drones don't have transponders, the software to fly
them ignores flight restrictions (or rather never has that) and so on - drones
need this extra stuff out of the factory.

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wyldfire
How feasible/infeasible would it be to permit firefighting aviators to emit a
regulatory alert beacon to any nearby drone and, if necessary, a regulatory
override? Maybe it would trigger some kind of landing function? It's hard to
imagine any kind of override function that doesn't introduce new hazards,
though.

If drone manufacturers could work with global spectrum allocation and
emergency response agencies, maybe they could avoid big legislative hammers.

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Circumnavigate
I have heard this is a danger as the drone could hit the rotors of a
helicopter causing a crash.

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dreamcompiler
They can also seriously damage low-flying fixed-wing tankers, which is why
tankers must leave the area immediately if a drone is sighted.

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gremlinsinc
Would this apply if your drone was used to fight fires?

I wonder if some drone system that flies swarms of drones and drops nitrogen
pellets that suck out oxygen could fight fires.

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BenjiWiebe
I am a volunteer firefighter. Our county uses a drone to watch fires, and let
the firefighters know where the fire is spreading to and how fast.

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dreamcompiler
I'm sure your drone is coordinated with Incident Command, which makes it not a
threat to the aerial tankers.

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BenjiWiebe
It is coordinated, plus we very rarely/never have any other aerial support.

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JustSomeNobody
How about just imposing a very large fine instead? However, if it impedes
rescue efforts, _then_ make it a felony (as it already would be).

