Amazon teases new details of planned Prime Air drone delivery service

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  • Reply 41 of 50
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post





    People don't have to respect the laws at first but the laws are necessary to prosecute them and they'll respect them eventually, just like with driving regulations. It's not just to prevent stupidity either, experienced operators have accidents like anyone else and the fewer the better.

    A simple band around the blade tips wouldn't make it too heavy to fly and I think this regulation should apply to airplane propellers, helicopters and boats. Drones can work just fine inside a full cage:







    A basic protection frame isn't much to add. The Parrot drone is already designed this way and can happily bang into walls and keep going.

    Not everyone is going to be aware of the danger, especially when people keep going around lying to everyone about how safe they are and then people or animals get hit and have lifelong injuries. Regulations prevent dangerous situations before they happen so the responsible thing to do is to add basic protection first. When you go to a country with lots of disease you get an inoculation before you go, you don't wait until you have a life-threatening illness to do something about it.

     

    Yes, small fragile cages work with tiny toys that can fly for 2 minutes. Scale it up to even a DJI sized quad and you have a problem.

    About the safety... do you know anyone personally that has been really hurt by a drone? Not the one in ten million that the news reports on... a real life person that you know that has been hurt by one of these millions of drones out there that are so dangerous?

     

    The bigger drones would be the country with the diseases. If you go there, you need to be protected and registered. Going to France doesn't require any shots.

     

    And again, there are already laws that deal with privacy, liability and responsibility. Why would making more laws work to make these safer? You can not outlaw stupid!

  • Reply 42 of 50
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by jfc1138 View Post

     

    "All of this tech that has been available and flying for decades is now all of a sudden dangerous to the world. Not really."

     

    Actually these aren't your grandmothers R/C aircraft at all. With GPS and autonomous flight control they're far more sophisticated with, for instance, no need at all to maintain line of sight for control purposes: these things can and will (in the case of loss of signal for instance) fly themselves. In the case of loss of signal they can be set to return to their start point autonomously. try that with a joystick R/C and see what happens.... Others have a "no fly zone" list loaded so they can detect when they're about to enter or launch into, say, an FAA restricted space such as around a major airport. No R/C has that sort of capability.


     

    So they are actually safer then yes?

    And yes, R/C has had this for more than a decade. They didn't just invent these things from scratch you know. GPS wasn't invented last year. It's just that the tech is getting smaller and smaller, and cheaper and cheaper.

  • Reply 43 of 50

    Ohh, a playground taut. Go ahead, impress me. I double dog dare you! 8-)

    You may want to re-read. I was saying the exact opposite. I have ZERO interest in trying to impress you.

    But, but, but, you've been double dog dared... no one can ignore a double dog dare. It just isn't done.
  • Reply 44 of 50
    Yes, small fragile cages work with tiny toys that can fly for 2 minutes. Scale it up to even a DJI sized quad and you have a problem.
    About the safety... do you know anyone personally that has been really hurt by a drone?

    I don't know anyone personally, but drones have been knocking turbans off terrorists for years...
  • Reply 45 of 50
    jfc1138jfc1138 Posts: 3,090member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by studiomusic View Post

     

     

    So they are actually safer then yes?

    And yes, R/C has had this for more than a decade. They didn't just invent these things from scratch you know. GPS wasn't invented last year. It's just that the tech is getting smaller and smaller, and cheaper and cheaper.




    Radio/Controlled specifically means NOT autonomous so the central feature of these newer aircraft was not present "for decades" on those old style model planes.

  • Reply 46 of 50
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jfc1138 View Post

     



    Radio/Controlled specifically means NOT autonomous so the central feature of these newer aircraft was not present "for decades" on those old style model planes.




    Here's a guy that did his thesis on making one in 2005... http://staff.ee.sun.ac.za/ikpeddle/files/UAV/MScThesis_ikpeddle.pdf

    Are you saying he invented all of the stuff he used in his project? No, it's been around for decades.

    Here's one from 1995: https://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~elkaim/Documents/sysid_aircraft.pdf

     

    How about a commercially available one in 1987: http://www.gizmag.com/go/2440/

     

    It was just very expensive and very technically challenging to do. Of course the government has been doing it since at least the 1950's.

     

    Just because today they are smaller, lighter, and more accurate doesn't mean it's more of a danger, it means the opposite in fact.

  • Reply 47 of 50
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,327moderator
    Yes, small fragile cages work with tiny toys that can fly for 2 minutes. Scale it up to even a DJI sized quad and you have a problem.

    http://store.dji.com/product/phantom-3-propeller-guard

    The only problem is they aren't mandatory yet.
  • Reply 48 of 50
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Marvin View Post





    http://store.dji.com/product/phantom-3-propeller-guard



    The only problem is they aren't mandatory yet.



    Those are the first things that get taken off sadly... and they are not a full cage and do not protect from above.

    Actually something like a full rotor cover would be a godsend to drone ops. The biggest cause of crashes I see with students is hitting trees with the rotors trying to get the foliage in the shot. But how to get full protection without disrupting the airflow... hmmmm. I'm actually working on that one. ;)

     

    You know that 95% of the time the quadcopter is in the air away from anyone or anything. So no danger to people or pets except when landing. Maybe be more careful when landing? Can we legislate that? 

  • Reply 49 of 50
    jfc1138jfc1138 Posts: 3,090member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by studiomusic View Post

     



    Here's a guy that did his thesis on making one in 2005... http://staff.ee.sun.ac.za/ikpeddle/files/UAV/MScThesis_ikpeddle.pdf

    Are you saying he invented all of the stuff he used in his project? No, it's been around for decades.

    Here's one from 1995: https://users.soe.ucsc.edu/~elkaim/Documents/sysid_aircraft.pdf

     

    How about a commercially available one in 1987: http://www.gizmag.com/go/2440/

     

    It was just very expensive and very technically challenging to do. Of course the government has been doing it since at least the 1950's.

     

    Just because today they are smaller, lighter, and more accurate doesn't mean it's more of a danger, it means the opposite in fact.




    Why focus on "danger"? I haven't so either a red herring or your own bugaboo.

     

    While "Um, remote control airplanes (and helicopters) have been around for decades." (from you) Which are most certainly NOT the type of aircraft the autonomous drones being discussed now are, are they?.

  • Reply 50 of 50
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jfc1138 View Post

     



    Why focus on "danger"? I haven't so either a red herring or your own bugaboo.

     

    While "Um, remote control airplanes (and helicopters) have been around for decades." (from you) Which are most certainly NOT the type of aircraft the autonomous drones being discussed now are, are they?.


     

    These are the same things that we have had for, yes, decades. Putting in new electronics doesn't change the category of flying craft. And to say that these drones are not remotely controlled is flat out wrong. Amazon can talk to and control their drones from a distance, or remotely. Sure they can do some things autonomously, but they are still R/C aircraft (which stands for radio controlled).

     

    The dangers to which I refute and rebut are to those saying that we ban these drones. You don't see all of the people talking about wounding animals and crashing into people?

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