

Colorado town has received pre-orders for 983 drone-hunting licenses - ericgoldberg
http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2013/09/06/deer_trail_co_sees_applications_for_nonexistent_drone_hunting_license.html

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Pinckney
_this line of reasoning seems like the least of our concerns in a discussion
centered around firing ammunition into the clouds_

Well you'd use birdshot, obviously. How does the author think people hunt
ducks?

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Zimahl
Well, everyone has seen a movie where someone shoots around up into the air
and it comes down just as fast as it went up, typically wounding someone.
Obviously physics doesn't allow that but the myth remains.

It's a lot like the shoot into the water and the bullet streaks through and
wounds people. There was a great Mythbusters that debunked that - the water
tears apart the bullet within about a foot of the surface. Yet, once again,
the myth remains.

~~~
jlgreco
Mythbusters have also done "bullet fired into the sky" as well, and while the
results were not terribly simple, the gist of it is that it should not be
considered safe (and there are confirmed incidents of people being killed that
way).

There are a few things going on, but most of it, IIRC, stems from the fact
that a bullet fired into the air is almost certainly not fired _straight_ into
the air, so it retains it's ballistic trajectory and spin. The spin keeps its
air resistance relatively low and gravity does not work against the horizontal
component of the bullets velocity. The bullet, fired slightly not straight up,
will therefore hit you with whatever velocity it got from falling nose first
from apogee, combined with whatever velocity sideways it started with (minus
some from air resistance).

Bullets fired from a rifled barrel straight up will turn over and tumble at
appogee, and their velocity on return will be only terminal velocity of the
bullet tumbling through the air. Presumably this case is safe, though
potentially painful.

Birdshot is safe I assume because the mass of the individual pellets are low
enough so that air resistance _is_ enough to arrest its velocity to something
safe. (also the pellets aren't nearly as streamlined as bullets are anyway,
though I wouldn't want to be downrange of buckshot fired into the air at an
angle...)

~~~
Zimahl
Yes, any horizontal distance is the danger, but that's not generally what
movies show. An example is the movie 'The Mexican'.

Birdshot is somewhat powerless anyways, at even minimal distances, although I
wouldn't particularily volunteer to be on the receiving end.

Ask Dick Cheney's hunting partner how this feels. I believe the doctors were
more concerned about a pellet traveling to his heart/brain via an artery
(possibly causing a heart attack or stroke) then the damage to his body.

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EthanHeilman
People can no longer claim that the BMG cartridge has no legitimate hunting
use.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.50_BMG](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.50_BMG)

~~~
hga
"What goes up must come down", and while that's often not such a big deal if
the bullet goes at a high enough angle due to relatively low terminal
velocities, a bullet that heavy (1.4 oz/29 g and on up) would do considerable
damage if it hits someone.

That said, some crazy big game hunters use it for long range shots. WAY too
much tissue damage for my family's tastes (as it were, what we hunt, we eat),
but it is used.

~~~
jlgreco
I don't really know much about hunting, but I imagine such a large round might
legitimately be necessary for things like bears or moose. You have a good
point though, you shouldn't be firing stuff other than birdshot into the sky.

~~~
hga
Anti-material rounds like .50 BMG are way overkill for anything you'll find in
North America, calibers in the .338/.375 range, with around 1/3 the weight and
energy are probably good enough (would have to check for bear, my family's
never hunted them and none are to be found in my home town). For "thick
skinned" dangerous game in Africa, heavier stuff is legally _required_ , but
the energies are still quite a bit lower than .50 BGM.

Hmmm, while it gets into "destructive device" territory ($200 Federal "tax"
per round and of course paperwork, which they aren't exactly required to
accept), something that explodes with a fuze that sets it off way before it
nears the ground is called for. You want proximity fuzing anyway ... send a
microprocessor after a bundle of them wrapped in an airframe ^_^.

~~~
stan_rogers
Anything in the "military .30-calibre" (.308, .30-06, .303) range is good
enough for bear (and moose) _hunting_ ; there's no need for exotics of any
sort when you can choose the presentation, and any of that class of round will
perform a humane kill (by any hunting standards) without unnecessary waste.

That said, one might want something heavier for _stopping_ bear, but the
ranges involved would suggest something more along the lines of a good 10- or
12-gauge slug than something with enough ballistic efficiency to have a kill
potential more than a mile away.

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lurkinggrue
I'm ok with this as long as they don't waste this as a trophy and properly
clean and eat the drone.

Otherwise imagine all the wasted money they could cause.

~~~
hga
Heh.

Semi-seriously, the two are not mutually exclusive, what's on display, bone,
antlers, tusks, fur, etc. is not fit to eat.

Not that I understand the trophy hunting mentality, although the best of them
make sure the tasty meat goes to a good home.

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fnordfnordfnord
Okay, now I kind of want them to make it an annual event where we go fly some
cheap throw-away styrofoam drones[1] and everybody gets together and shoots
them out of the sky like skeet. You, know, safely, with minimal drunkenness.
Anyway, it would be great if it became so popular that the FAA had no choice
but to issue a TFR over the town for the event.

[1] like the kind you make for RC dogfighting

~~~
ericgoldberg
For some reason, I can't see your username

~~~
fnordfnordfnord
Lucky for you!

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seoguru
When I saw the headline I thought people wanted to hunt _using_ drones. I
guess that will be next year.

~~~
cm127
I was really disappointed when I realized it wasn't that. Maybe you don't need
a license for that.

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t0
Let's hope this becomes a felony when the drone laws are updated in 2015.

~~~
t0
No, wait. HN is ok with shooting down our technological advances.

