BS: Drones

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jos
Date: 09 Jan 19 - 04:55 AM

In fact, although I say HeathROW, I say HEATHrow airport.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 09 Jan 19 - 02:29 AM

I say HEATHrow too. If someone said HeathROW I'd assume it was the name of a street of houses (Heath Row).

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Jan 19 - 02:09 AM

"I've never said anything other than HEATHrow all my life."

Me too Steve, as does everyone I know. Never heard anyone, English, Outer Mongolian, or whatever, talk about HeathROW. It's also WEEKend where I come from, and YESterday.

Mebbe it's a Norf/Sarf fing?

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 07:05 PM

I've never said anything other than HEATHrow all my life.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Mossback
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 06:57 PM

Mud Elves take note: this thread is mis-titled.

It should be designated as "ASSHOLES"

Drones are a piece of machinery- neither good nor bad.

As usual, the morons who use these machines for asinine stuff should be regulated - or better yet assassinated.

Ya can't cure stupid.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 06:09 PM

We love Edinburgh Airport. Fly direct from Norwich, only takes an hour in a little Dornier plane.

I suppose these idiots-with-drones could pop up at any airport and have 'fun' disrupting flights and causing enormous distress. There should be stiff punishments for doing it.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 06:04 PM

Maybe a bit selfish, but I would do anything to avoid travelling via Heathrow or Gatwick. Travel companies S of the Border seem to think its the only way (at the cost for us N of the Border of an extra flight!)
Edinburgh is our local airport, and while it may not be immune from drone attack, any flying we do starts and finishes here!
(e.g. Buenos Aires - Air France to CDG Paris, then long-haul to Buenos Aires, Singapore - AF to Paris CDG then onward to Singapore, only 2 flights)

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 05:35 PM

In my day, the aircraft were mostly propeller types, not jets, so not all that noisy. My father (ex RAF) was crazy about planes and used to identify them all for me, eg Stratocruiser etc.

One of my friends called Susan (most of them were called Susan!) lived opposite the runway at London Airport, on the Bath Road.

I used to go swimming in Heston swimming pool Jos. Not far from Hounslow!

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jos
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 05:20 PM

I spent two or three years in the sixties living in Hounslow West under the flight path. It was a first-floor flat and it seemed as if the aircraft coming in to land would fly in through the kitchen window and out through the living room. Sometimes the wind changed and the planes were taking off, which was much louder and more disrupting.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 05:06 PM

My first seventeen years of life were spent very near there. We could see the control tower clearly from the windows of our classrooms at the grammar school.
As a child my father often took me to the new Queen's Building, where one could go up on the top to view the aircraft.
But in those days, it was called London Airport!

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jos
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 05:06 PM

Heathrow has two runways, one being used for taking off and the other one for landing, and the drone was only seen near one of them.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jos
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 05:01 PM

Newsreaders and broadcasters just seem to follow the latest trends. It's not just HEATHrow, we also get yesterDAY (as if emphasising that it isn't yesternight) instead of YESterday, and 'on the WEEKend' instead of 'at the weekEND'.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Thompson
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 04:03 PM

I notice, by the way, that the newscasters are now calling the airport HEATHrow rather than, as English people have always done heretofore, HeathROW.

As for the drones, they're the equivalent of the lasers that bold boys shone into pilots' eyes with dangerous effect a few years ago. (I met a neighbour of mine one day and a kid had just done this to him as he sat at the front seat on the upper salon of a bus. He raced off the bus, collared the lad and gave him a few good thumps, which may not have been correct or wise, but certainly re-educated the little vermin.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 03:59 PM

Me too Jos.
I saw on the News that they were continuing with landings throughout the scare. Odd, because I'd have thought the danger was the same whether an aircraft was taking off or coming down.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jos
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 03:45 PM

The latest I heard was that after about an hour, flights to and from Heathrow resumed. I hope it stays that way.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 01:26 PM

Oh crumbs Iains! And there was I thinking Heathrow might escape the Curse of The Drones!
He flies on July 31st. Maybe they'll have sorted it out by then? I do feel sorry for all the folk who are delayed/stranded today though. Nightmare!

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 08 Jan 19 - 01:12 PM

and now Heathrow

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1069060/heathrow-airport-drone-latest-flight-status-suspended-runway-closed-london-news

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: BobL
Date: 04 Jan 19 - 03:20 AM

Credible witnesses have also sighted UFOs Such as airline pilots perhaps, who aren't going to risk going near enough to identify them.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 03 Jan 19 - 05:53 PM

I'm still surprised that no other UK airports have been shut down because of drones. Most odd.

Husband has now had to change his travel schedule as blooming Air Portugal have cancelled some of their flights from Gatwick (one of which was his) and he got cross and demanded a refund.

He's booked a different journey now with Air Brussels, flying from Heathrow. Just two flights to get him to Abidjan. And if The Drones are not in evidence (fingers crossed) it should all proceed safely."Insh Allah" as he puts it.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 03 Jan 19 - 02:14 PM

Credible witnesses have also sighted UFOs. Most people tend to laugh at them.(I keep an open mind)

I would say a "convenient" explanation of monumental incompetence and mass hysteria. Personally I think something else was going on but I have not a clue as to what.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 03 Jan 19 - 09:40 AM

I think what they said was 115 sightings, 93 of them from credible witnesses. Which if you read it carefully is not precisely the same.

My view is that it a combination of monumental incompetence and mass hysteria.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 02 Jan 19 - 03:41 PM

"A £50,000 reward for information has been issued by Crimestoppers, which said it had "passed on close to 30 pieces of information to law enforcement within the first 24 hours".

A suggestion by a senior Sussex police officer that there may have been no drones was later dismissed as a "miscommunication".

The force said it was investigating "relevant sightings" from 115 witnesses - 93 of whom it described as "credible" - including airport staff, police officers and a pilot.

The MoD said: "The military capability has now been withdrawn from Gatwick. The Armed Forces stand ever-ready to assist should a request for support be received."

Tens of thousands delayed at the airport because of drones. Probably 90% had a phone with a camera. There were also numerous "officials" , drone hunting, yet not a single photograph or video has been seen.

Does anyone still believe that a drone ever existed, or did some other
occurrence require flights to be grounded?

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: leeneia
Date: 01 Jan 19 - 12:07 PM

I've often thought that drones should be considered for locating puppy mills and meth labs.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Jan 19 - 08:44 AM

I see a man was arrested for climbing up one of the towers of the Severn Bridge and attempting to fly a blooming drone. It meant the bridge was closed for ages and it caused tailbacks. What a clot!

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Dec 18 - 04:40 PM

Well really! That's like something from Rowan Atkinson's sitcom The Thin Blue Line or the Keystone Cops! Absolutely ridiculous.
There will have to be an independent inquiry.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jack Campin
Date: 31 Dec 18 - 04:20 PM

The latest suggestion from the police is that almost all, if not all, of the drone sightings were of their own drones sent up to investigate. Same sort of scenario as GK Chesterton's book where a terrorist cell was entirely composed of secret policemen spying on each other.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 30 Dec 18 - 01:53 AM

A-a-and.......100! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 10:05 PM

It is specifically the British government which is trying to deny these people access to Britain. No use you trying to blame Macron for that. And Britain has been complicit in every single one of the illegal wars you cite.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 04:36 PM

"I take issue with the British government forcing them into such desperate measures in the first place."

Well you may take issue with the British Government but you would be more accurate blaming American foreign policy and their illegal wars in Africa and the Middle east. A close second is the coalition that has supported them in their misadventures. Where have the bulk of the refugees come from and who created them? The western supported Arab Spring created swathes of refugees from Syria. It was a major tourist resort when under the control of Assad and any political emigrants comprised a mere handful. You are not another anglophobe are you?
France still has troops on the ground in Syria, creating further refugees. Why is your outrage not directed to Macron? or the rest of the participants?
    Australia (Operation Okra)
    Bahrain.
    Belgium.
    Canada (Operation Impact § In Syria – pulling out soon)
    France (Opération Chammal)
    Germany (Operation Counter Daesh)
    Netherlands on 29 January 2016

Syria — 6.3 million refugees
Afghanistan — 2.6 million refugees
South Sudan — 2.4 million refugees
Somalia — 986,400 refugees

Not forgetting 22.4 million in need of aid in the Yemen and not forgetting the destruction in Libya and Iraq to support American hegemony.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 03:48 PM

As I understand it, the rule is that people fleeing oppression or persecution should seek asylum in the first safe country they reach.
Why do these unfortunate migrants take such dangerous risks when they were already in France, a safe country?

Also, the real rogues are the people traffickers, who take money from the travellers and load them onto a dodgy boat.

I wonder if there have been drownings/sinkings in the Channel which haven't yet been discovered? God forbid.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 03:30 PM

I take issue with the British government forcing them into such desperate measures in the first place.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 03:28 PM

Davis Carter I would take issue with Macron's government allowing the
illegal immigrants to pose a risk not only to themselves but to those involved rescuing them from a very busy shipping lane. Where is the French Navy, defending Paris?

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 03:03 PM

And for goodness sake Iains, we do not now have "an invasion of inflatables from France". Its a small number of inflatables, and a small number of people. The problem here is that the people in the boats might get drowned, not that they might get in. If they do get in I would wager that having endured that, they will make a better contribution to the economy and society of Britain than the vast majority of people moaning about them.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 03:00 PM

What I hear is the desperate sound of arse-covering. Most likely there has been a massive overreaction to a couple of hysterical phone calls. Followed by the publicity given to these phone calls giving rise to a whole lot more. Followed by those in authority wondering just what it is they have done. And trying to find reasons that it isn't their fault. No conspiracy, just monumental incompetence.

The alternative is that a couple of spotty teenagers in a garage in Crawley have outwitted the CAA, the police, the army and the security apparatus of the UK. Not impossible, I know.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 01:20 PM

Note the date of the link.
https://www.tomsguide.com/us/faa-skytracker-drone-detection-airports,news-22313.html
Is it simply a scare story to drive away drone flying near airports?
Or is it real? Surely Europe has an equal vulnerability to rogue drones, not simply because jets engine do not ingest then altogether successfully, but also because their payload may be more than a camera.
Either the CAA in the UK has been very remiss in not addressing what a two year old would recognise to be a potential problem, or we are being mislead, Interesting that a 51% stake in Garwick has been sold to the French, to become a fact very shortly. We now have an invasion of inflatables from France carrying illegal immigrants and drones no longer have headlines.
I suspect we are being played for fools.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 12:33 PM

I'm still puzzled and sceptical Dave. It's all very odd and unsubstantiated. I'm not one to go rushing into a conspiracy theory or think the Martians have landed, but something is being withheld here from the general public.

Ah Jack, we have a photo of the Kaaba during the Hajj on the wall of our bedroom, and my husband prays facing it (towards the East) He's never performed the Hajj but would really like to.

The nature photos our village chap takes are really beautiful. He flew his small drone past a barn owl perched high up in a tree and got a picture of its rather startled face. And our Wensum Valley pools at dawn, with wild geese arriving.

I'm sure there are responsible drone users, but I still think they should all be registered and certificated, and put on a Police database.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jack Campin
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 07:02 AM

Drone photography contest winners

This is one of the more mindblowing ones. Who would have guessed Mecca looks like this?

Grand Mosque at night

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 06:49 AM

The more you read about the Gatwick incident, the stranger this seems. At the moment the one thing I would take seriously is the comment by DCS Jason Tingley, that there may not have been any drone in the first place. This was stomped on following a communication from the government (what do they know about it?) to the police, and the Chief Constable now says he is absolutely certain there was a drone. Honest Guv. He says that DCS Tingley was describing an investigative approach which seeks to establish whether there was a drone or not. Well, yes, he is a DCS, thats sort of his job. But there is no photo or film of a drone, and the reports of a damaged drone near the perimeter fence have disappeared (probably because it was rusty and months old). So, there is no hard evidence for a drone. What there are 115 reports, "92 of them from credible people". 1 each from 92 credible people or 92 from one credible person? And who says who is a credible person?

I am sorry, but there is more evidence for the Loch Ness Monster than for there having been a drone over Gatwick.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: BobL
Date: 29 Dec 18 - 03:46 AM

JHW, the reason model aircraft weren't such a problem is that to build them and fly them, you had to be an enthusiast. All such people that I knew, banded together in model aircraft clubs where the more level-headed ones had a guiding influence. Membership of the SMAE (now the British Model Flying Association) was not obligatory, but near-universal anyway, and this body provided guidelines for safe flight.
Developments in motors, batteries and fly-by-wire electronics made today's multirotor aircraft possible, which can be flown more-or-less "out of the box". This can be a social hobby - think drone racing - or a solitary one.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 09:03 PM

I have a Syma S107G that cost about the same. Like the other few things I have, not flown in a while and it this case (the others have batteries you can just plug in and remove) never got round to finding out about replacing the battery when it failed.

Dead easy to fly and as said before, I think the concentric rotor ones are naturally stable (and incidentally, don’t use a tail rotor to stop the craft spinning round, the main rotor blades spinning in different directions take care of that and allow turning). They can’t (at least usually) do the side to side movement you’d might expect from a “normal” helicopter though. I've also got a couple of small fixed pitch ones I could cope with.


Some info on different types of RC helicopters here

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 08:10 PM

I've got one of those tiny little remote-controlled helicopters. Cost me about seventeen quid. I'm bloody useless at it, but my son is a genius with it. It won't fly in bright sunshine.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 06:09 PM

When we were out today in the car we drove past a shop in town which sells remote-controlled model aeroplanes, cars and so on. It had a new billboard outside on the pavement which said in huge red letters WE SELL DRONES.
At first I thought it might be a rather sick joke, but after consideration we both reckoned it was genuine.
People are cashing in on this aren't they?

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: JHW
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 05:35 PM

When I was a bairn, way back in last century you could get model aircraft with tiny petrol engines controlled by radio. Don't remember any complaints.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jack Campin
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 05:13 AM

There is an annual international drone photography contest which gets astonishing results. I assume even a small drone can carry as good a camera as any mobile phone.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 04:05 AM

Anyone here have experience using drones for photography? Can a small drone take good photos? How much does it cost for a drone with a reasonably good camera? Any recommendations?
-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Iains
Date: 27 Dec 18 - 03:59 AM

Not a great few days for UK airports. First a drone at Gatwick, an IT failure at Heathrow, and then a fault with Birmingham’s air traffic control. Does anyone see a pattern here? Blame Drones/santa's reindeer/pesky Russians, while hiding an internal failure, and what compensation liability exists?

Who is for crowdfunding a massive libel claim for the two innocents falsely accused?

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Jack Campin
Date: 26 Dec 18 - 06:53 PM

Since posting to this thread I have been getting regular sponsored ads on Facebook for training courses in commercial drone piloting.

Hmmm.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Mossback
Date: 26 Dec 18 - 06:44 PM

Drones: and them as run 'em are Unidentified Flaming Assholes.

They fly over MY property, I'll gun 'em down toot sweet. Twelve bore with # 4 shot ought to do it.

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Mr Red
Date: 26 Dec 18 - 04:57 PM

well it wasn't an eggplant that ate Chicago

Subject: RE: BS: Drones
From: Senoufou
Date: 25 Dec 18 - 08:35 AM

Perhaps it was the one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater?