I thought all of Manhattan was a no fly zone?

[Q
UOTE="Hendricks, post: 1299074, member: 18742"]Absolutely!

One thing you sure don't want to do after you have( or are ) doing something illegal is draw attention to yourself.

Mr. Deas is going to find out pretty quickly what a FAA fine feels like. :(

His actions really underline the problem with drone operators who ignore federal regulations governing drone use.

The good thing is that these people generally operate the same way:

They do illegal things with their drones and then post their 'achievements' on the Internet.

"Hey, look what I did!"

Hopefully, the FAA zeros in on this guy shortly.[/QU
I'm sure that my comment or I will get kicked off the sight for saying this but I am going to. I thought that the video was good and I can't believe how much hate there is on this sight wishing bad things on this person. I personally think that there are too many government regulations (many put in place in the Obama era) and that we shouldn't be cheering for the government to "get someone" as quickly as possible. There are way too many no fly zones. I live in Houston and there are probably zero places to fly legally. I fly at a park where fortunately the constables wave at me and I hear that one actually has a drone and flies. I am at the point where I feel like throwing my Phantom 3 Pro away because of how hard it is to even find a place to fly. The regulations have gone way overboard. Cheer on. Cheer for the outlawing of drones altogether why don't you. A lot of the people on here sound like some of the people I hear who laugh about shooting at drones for sport.
 
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Just checked the sectional chart. Manhattan is in class B airspace, half starting at the surface an half starting at 500ft. To fly in that controlled air space you would need a waiver wich I doubt would be approved. You would also need a waiver to fly over people which I understan is never approved.
 
I'm sure that my comment or I will get kicked off the sight for saying this but I am going to. I thought that the video was good and I can't believe how much hate there is on this sight wishing bad things on this person. I personally think that there are too many government regulations (many put in place in the Obama era) and that we shouldn't be cheering for the government to "get someone" as quickly as possible. There are way too many no fly zones. I live in Houston and there are probably zero places to fly legally. I fly at a park where fortunately the constables wave at me and I hear that one actually has a drone and flies. I am at the point where I feel like throwing my Phantom 3 Pro away because of how hard it is to even find a place to fly. The regulations have gone way overboard. Cheer on. Cheer for the outlawing of drones altogether why don't you. A lot of the people on here sound like some of the people I hear who laugh about shooting at drones for sport.
Here's the thing Richard. I am no fan of the government and it's tyrannical regulations and overreach. But I think you can disapprove of the law and also disapprove of the law breaker at the same time. I despise this guy (and I will admit it freely) out of pure jealousy. I am a very experience Aerial Cinematographer and FAA certified pilot. As a result I have all of the skills necessary to achieve these beautiful shots and, would give anything to have footage like that on my reel as well as get a full page spread in a magazine. Hell any of our businesses would go through the roof! The problem is that the only reason why we can not compete with a guy like this is because we are not willing to break the law and or risk the safety of others. So I would humbly submit that like the rules or not, when law-abiding people can not compete and criminals prosper because their competition has their hands tied by morality, It is understandable and I think you would agree, that it can incite some of the outrage you are reading here.
 
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Richard Don't throw away your phantom !! Instead learn how to read sectional charts. I checked and most of the airports in that area are class E starting at 700Ft. That would make the underlying space class G good to fly with notification to ATC for recreational pilots. It's hard to read the sectional on my tablet but in the area I found only three exceptions Huston which appears to have 4 shelves. The inner starts at surface the next out starts at 2500 the next 3000 and the outer 7500. The other two are a class E starting at surface one west of Houston and one SW. As I said it's hard to read on my tablet so don't take my observation as fact. Learn to read the sectional and draw your own conclusions. Or better yet study for the 107, if you like flying drones you will probably enjoy it. Plenty of study guides on you tube. Link to sectional: http://aeronav.faa.gov/content/aeronav/sectional_files/PDFs/Houston_100_P.pdf Link to very good tutorial (as a starter)
. can copy and past URL if it does not show as a link. If you decide to take and pass the exam you'll get a cool looking FAA citification and no need to notify for class G airspace.
 
Absolutely!

One thing you sure don't want to do after you have( or are ) doing something illegal is draw attention to yourself.

Mr. Deas is going to find out pretty quickly what a FAA fine feels like. :(

His actions really underline the problem with drone operators who ignore federal regulations governing drone use.

The good thing is that these people generally operate the same way:

They do illegal things with their drones and then post their 'achievements' on the Internet.

"Hey, look what I did!"

Hopefully, the FAA zeros in on this guy shortly.
Reminds me of some of my red neck Arkansas family. The last words out if their mouths before they off themselves for their chance at winning a Darwin Award are...."Hey, y'all... Watch this!"
 
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I am at the point where I feel like throwing my Phantom 3 Pro away because of how hard it is to even find a place to fly.
Don't throw it away - my wife is envious and wants a drone of her own!

I'll very gladly pay the freight! :)

Hey, I'm in NYC so I feel your pain.

I think to a great extent there's just a lot of paranoia. Of course when a Blackhawk suffers $.25M in damage, for example, it's awfully hard to claim that it's all paranoia! And a few years ago I saw some idjits following joggers around the trails in Kissena Park. Total turn-off to the hobby. I was revolted by their behavior.

But practically speaking, I think about Flushing Meadow Park here, where it is not unusual for kite fliers to roll out a thousand feet of string, ridiculously close to the KLGA approach, and where the wrong wind would easily have your kite landing in the middle of one of two six-lane highways. But God forbid you fly a quad copter outside the little AMA sanctioned tether-plane field there...

I just got back from Korea. Apparently the Seoul Metro Area and actually the entire northern tier of the country has recently become a NFZ but the whole idea of me getting a quad copter in the first place was to get decent pictures of our property there. Argh - timing is everything. But seriously, I've never seen anything in the air around there unless it was thousands of feet up, and I wouldn't be looking anywhere near anything sensitive.

So... I may have taken some very careful and conservative liberties. Fortunately its a society that doesn't get butthurt about stuff unless you're doing something absurdly invasive, and the one neighbor who saw me was enjoying the show. Folks in the 'States seem much more indignant, and their moral compasses seem to rely on written word over common sense.
 
I'm sure that my comment or I will get kicked off the sight for saying this but I am going to. I thought that the video was good and I can't believe how much hate there is on this sight wishing bad things on this person. I personally think that there are too many government regulations (many put in place in the Obama era) and that we shouldn't be cheering for the government to "get someone" as quickly as possible. There are way too many no fly zones. I live in Houston and there are probably zero places to fly legally. I fly at a park where fortunately the constables wave at me and I hear that one actually has a drone and flies. I am at the point where I feel like throwing my Phantom 3 Pro away because of how hard it is to even find a place to fly. The regulations have gone way overboard. Cheer on. Cheer for the outlawing of drones altogether why don't you. A lot of the people on here sound like some of the people I hear who laugh about shooting at drones for sport.

Richard, you won't get booted/banned for stating things like you did. You have to bust some of the Community Guidelines for that to happen.

With that being said, you're absolutely wrong about not having anywhere to fly. I'm sorry but I have ZERO sympathy because you don't think you can find a place to fly. That's just a very narrow way to look at it. You've got to realize we are operating out TOYS inside National Airspace System and what we are doing could very well affect human LIVES! There is not other way to put it.

We flew R/C aircraft for decades (I started in 1974) at designated flying fields across the country. We drove around until we found a place to fly safely. Sometimes we would have to drive an hour+ each way just to fly for a few minutes. That's what we did in order to fly safely and follow the rules.

If you only want to fly at 50' and at a local park (where you're not interfering with MANNED aircraft) then sell your current aircraft and buy one that can't fly any higher, father, autonomously. Get an aircraft that can't fly into NAS and you'll have nothing to worry about.

If you want to play in the Big Boy sand box then learn the rules, regulations, and how to read the sectionals so you can do so safely. That's really all you need to do.
 
As others have said - this is irresponsible and illegal. Having said that and re-reading your post, are you perhaps asking that if this is a NFZ (which it is) how are the motors even able to start? (making it possible to even take the flight)
Could be flying with other brand quad. Not everyone flies with DJI.
 
That's a good idea.
DJI should program all of the drones they sell to have a program inside them that disables them if they are asked to start a flight within any NFZ.
As it stands now, if I wanted to fly my P4 within a 5 mile radius of an airport, my HUD would tell me that I was inside a NFZ;however, I would then be able to disregard this and continue with my flight.

Yes, DJI could install a safety feature on their drones that would disable them for flight if they were located within NFZs.
Two weeks ago I tested my Phantom 4 about 200 yards from the fence of a Class D Airport. At about 10 feet altitude I got a warning message about restricted airspace. I ascended to 30 feet altitude and ended my test. Last week after FW update I tried at the very same spot. The motors would not even start. Not with DJI Go or Litchi not even manually. I drove home and everything worked fine.
 
Just a thought that hasn't been covered - would the magazine's lawyers allow the mag to ask for, let alone print, shots that were obtained illegally? Surely they would put themselves in a compromising position.

Sure, there might be public interest occasions where illegally taken photos might be published, but to commission them just for pretty shots seems unlikely to me.
Of course, I'm not used to US laws..
 
Rules are rules.

Here, in Canada, the rules governing the use of drones is being reviewed by the federal government early next year, after there was much criticism of the rules put in place in March of this year.
Everybody understood the ' no drone zone ' surrounding airports and other federally administered areas.
Everybody understood the 150 foot minimum ceiling over buildings,vehicles,people,animals and ships.

Drone operators have asked Transport Canada to take a look at two rules which should be re-visited and, perhaps, adjusted.

These pertain to the 300 foot maximum operating ceiling and no flying after sunset.

I join with many other responsible drone pilots out there who feel the 300 foot maximum ceiling should be adjusted to allow for higher flights.

Also, the 'no flying after dark' rule should also be re-visited to allow for night time flights-while operating within all other rules.

The good news is the federal government is open to discussing some changes to the rules under which drone flights should occur.

Communication between the two sides is a welcome thing.

In Canada, the minimum distance you need to keep your drone laterally away away from people, buildings etc. is 100 feet if your drone weighs up to 250 grams, and 250 feet away if your drone weighs over 250 grams (half a pound). At least they removed "You can't fly over a built up area". Most people don't understand the lateral distance concept. If the drone was to drop straight down, it would have to be 250 feet away from the person, building etc.

I don't see the problem with 300 feet AGL as the limit. They could allow 400 feet as they do in the US, but anything higher and you should be required to have a special permit for the flight. Too many helicopters, float planes and others that have permission to be at a lower altitude.

As for night flying, maybe require an increased distance to be kept from people, buildings etc, and require a maximum lateral distance of 1000 feet away.

The problem is the government is not acting, they are reacting. They say the biggest danger is the weight of the drone, yet in almost all cases it is the type of operator who has created the problem. Transport Canada is hiring students to approve SFOC permits. I had a discussion with one fellow who told me I couldn't take off or land in a built up area, and my SFOC was for a property in Toronto! Also, even though I followed all the regulations, and filed all the required notices, and contacted all the local airports, a small plane flew almost right over my area of operation. It was probably higher than 300 feet, but it looked a lot lower to me.

In short, it may be possible to get drone footage in a No Fly Zone, but people would have to have the proper permissions and chances are this person did not have permission.
 
You can pretty much fly wherever you want if you can confuse the LEO's which usually isn't very hard.
 
So how are these even possible?
A Drone’s Eye View of New York
Today I needed to take some images of The Bronx. (part of NYC, actually called a "borough". I called the LGA tower cab and advised them of my intentions. I spoke with "Brian AK". He was professional and friendly. Said "no problem", took down my particulars including FAA ID. I then contacted the desk Sgt at the appropriate NYPD precinct. No problem there as well. He went into detail and took appropriate time with me. He told me that there are 5 designated "parks" in NYC where you just unpack and fly (as far as THEY, NYPD, are concerned), still need to notify the FAA if in their controlled airport airspace. NYC has a "policy" of NO Drones IN NYC (except those 5 parks), BUT, the desk Sgt. told me that if FAA says "no problem, have fun", then the FAA "OK" OVERRIDES the NYC Rule, he said. Anyway I did my flight and had no issues. I dot all i's and cross all t's.
 
Bronx area under part 107:

NEW YORK CLASS B AREA A Airspace requires FAA Part 107 waiver.

Borough, south of Sunset park does not require a waiver.

AirMap Web App
 

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