SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
A police drone had a "near-miss" with a fighter jet travelling at 520mph (836km/h), a report has revealed.
The drone's operator "honestly believed" the two would collide in mid-air, according to [PDF] the UK Airprox Board. It said the risk of a crash above Throwleigh, Devon, was "high" but the officer had lowered the drone quickly. Devon and Cornwall Police said it had notified Airprox, which was "content that there was no blame nor any lessons to be learned".
The drone was flying at an altitude of about 300ft (90m) on 16 January, according to the report. "The jet came into view from right to left and seemed to pass by the drone at the same altitude; it looked like the jet was within 200m laterally of the drone. Once the jet was in view it started banking to the right and [the operator] honestly believed it was going to collide with the drone."
"The jet continued and was followed a few seconds later by a second jet."
The F-15 pilot, who was flying at an altitude of 500ft (152m), could not see the drone, the report added. The board said the case had prompted discussions about whether the service which helps the military plan routes through UK airspace should incorporate information from other sources.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by VLM on Thursday May 31 2018, @02:58PM (12 children)
The letter of the law in the US would be the jet was in the wrong unless special situation or special training location. In practice the military gets away with a lot of stuff that would be a civilian violation.
Let me think... if in class C airspace, not allowed over 200 knots below 2500 feet altitude, below 10K altitude you're limited to 250 knots (without ATC permission anyways). Minimum altitude of 1000 feet over populated (where police drones fly?) areas. Minimum altitude of 500 feet over rural areas, but other than training why would a drone be over 500 ft altitude over a cornfield... missing rural person or escaped convict, maybe...) . In the middle of freakin nowhere the FAA lets pilots do what they will BUT its the pilots responsibility to stay 500 feet away from people, vehicles (drones), structures, pretty much anything but wilderness. Theres also a handwavy thing about being high enough to safely land, and exemption for landing and taking off obviously.
So yeah the jet pilot, if he were in the USA, would be violating a metric (well, imperial-measure) shitton of laws, which as I previously stated are never enforced on military pilots. The aviation laws are vary similar although probably microscopically different in the UK police state.
Aircraft are generally constructed to whack flying birds and mostly survive with minimal damage although flying tanks don't work so there's always the golden b-b scenario of hitting a 40 pound pelican or swan in just the exact wrong spot leading to terrible crash, although it doesn't happen much in practice. In that way, hitting your average drone isn't THAT much worse than hitting your average seagull, although it should be avoided when easily possible.
In practice even if the military pilot gets away with everything Top Gun style as usual, the drone op should think a little harder about flying around military training areas which are usually reasonably well posted and easily avoidable. Or a simple phone call to the nearest tower, etc.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by FatPhil on Thursday May 31 2018, @03:21PM (6 children)
"""
Military low flying is used to train military aircrew. Low flying by military aircraft is carried out across all of the UK.
Low flying means:
fixed-wing aircraft flying down to 250 feet from the ground
rotary-wing aircraft (for example helicopters) flying down to 100 feet from the ground
"""
The 500 feet is well over that 250 feet limit. So I'd be surprised if the cops weren't more to blame. What case were they investigating at the time? Or were they just out for a bit of a joyride during work hours on taxpayers' expense?
This was near Dartmoor, there's lots of military stuff going on near Dartmoor, so if there's been one, I would expect there to have been many buzzings of the tors.
Personally, I'm most perturbed that that .gov.uk is still using feet as a measurement. They'll not be landing any climate observers onto Mars any time soon.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 31 2018, @03:49PM (5 children)
In aviation, feet are used internationally for specifying altitude.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday May 31 2018, @04:13PM (4 children)
However, yes, that also perturbs me.
As do knots.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 4, Funny) by wonkey_monkey on Thursday May 31 2018, @05:18PM
You can get velcro shoes for grown-ups, too.
systemd is Roko's Basilisk
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday May 31 2018, @07:18PM
Levels are only used at altitude, for vertical separation of planes in route. In most places the finest grained levels are 1000 feet.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Osamabobama on Thursday May 31 2018, @08:12PM (1 child)
You may be interested in a bit of trivia; metric flight levels [wikipedia.org] are used in ...
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday June 01 2018, @12:10PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2, Informative) by nitehawk214 on Thursday May 31 2018, @03:50PM (3 children)
Here is an example of an F-4 killing an entire airliner [wikipedia.org] full of people because the Air Force decided they were too good for transponders or IFR or contacting ATC when flying near a civilian airport.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 1) by nitehawk214 on Thursday May 31 2018, @04:18PM
Correction, USMC not AF.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 3, Insightful) by frojack on Thursday May 31 2018, @11:29PM
Good job, reaching back 47 years for an example.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday June 01 2018, @12:18PM
Didn't Alanis Morissette write a song about that?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Thursday May 31 2018, @07:34PM
You've been watching too many Top Gun reruns.
Military pilots get reamed quite severly for this kind of show-boating, especially over populated areas.
However In the present case:
Everybody was following the rules it would appear.
The Rules need to be updated.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.