Re:FAA Moves Toward Treating Drones and Planes as Equals
by seppel on Monday October 08, 2018 @07:51PM
(#18172284)
> range of a few kilometres and an operational ceiling of several hundred feet
The ceiling altitude is a software limit, which is applied relative to the take-off altitude. The physical limit of, e.g., a Mavic Pro is somewhere around 5km, where the air desity gets too low.
If you take off on 2km mountain and fly straight, the software ceiling still applies to the take-off height, so you can easily reach an airspace where you should not be (to my knowledge).
Re:FAA Moves Toward Treating Drones and Planes as Equals
by abstractbeliefs on Monday October 08, 2018 @09:29PM
(#18172697)
You might be at an altitude above mean sea level that _can_ be covered by different airspace rules, but terrain is scary to aircraft, and safety altitudes around it tend to be generous.
If you're on a tall hill that would otherwise infringe on airspace you shouldn't fly in, chances are the safety altitude for that region is still going to be greater than the paper limit for if you were on plains at MSL.
Re:FAA Moves Toward Treating Drones and Planes as Equals
by taneq on Tuesday October 09, 2018 @02:18AM
(#18173704)
Yeah, I was being conservative with the height. A low end drone can do hundreds of feet, a high end one can do much more.
As for height, it's measured relative to takeoff altitude I believe. So you can take off, fly off a cliff, and still be legal.
The problem here is that any half-decent consumer grade drone has a range of a few kilometres and an operational ceiling of several hundred feet. You can't rely on 'just flying it sensibly' when a software bug could send it anywhere within the hardware's limits.
The risk of this causing serious harm is very small and the hyperventilation induced by it in some of the community is overblown, but it is there.