Always keep in mind that one million times zero equals zero.
- Manlobbi
Investment Strategies / Mechanical Investing
No. of Recommendations: 5
Rather than continue to banter about the latest conspiracy theories, how about we get a little background information about drones operating over people and at night.
The FAA has a nice overview of that. Here's the link:
https://www.faa.gov/uas/commercial_operators/opera...And here are what I believe are relevant highlights
The FAA published a rule that became effective on April 21, 2021. This ruling dramatically changed the landscape for drone (what the FAA calls unmanned aircraft or UA) operations.
There was a prior rule issued in 2016 that dealt with UA weighing less than 55 pounds. That ruling prohibited operation of these small UA over people or at night. They also included certification for the remote pilots of these aircraft. The older ruling allowed UA pilots to request an exemption to these prohibitions.
This new ruling laid out procedures for UA pilots to operate over people and at night. This eliminated the need for the exemption process under the prior ruling.
Specific to the recent paranoia, night operations of a UA have two requirements. The remote pilot needs to be properly licensed for night operations and the UA needs specific lighting, including flashing lights.
Now, for my interpretation of what is happening.
Until 2021, there were effectively no drone operations at night. Sure, there were likely some exceptions issued, but night flying drones were rare, especially over people. With these new rules, anyone can fly a drone at night. You don't need any particular reason, just some pilot training and a compliant drone. Now that night drones are much less restricted, they're getting more common. But people aren't used to seeing them. So rather than slow down and think rationally, people panic. (Cue agent K - A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals.)
What we are seeing in the skies over New Jersey and elsewhere around the country is nothing more than the free market providing drones properly equipped for night flight and individuals choosing to get properly licensed to fly them. We've all seen some of those beautiful drone video shots of landscapes and other scenery. Until now, they're all been day time videos. Now there's going to be night videos as well. But night videos of Yellowstone Park aren't going to be that interesting. Night videos of cities - that's going to look good.
Or it's aliens. After all, I've always liked a good documentary, and those rarely get better than the Men In Black series of documentaries.
--Peter
No. of Recommendations: 2
No. of Recommendations: 2
What we are seeing in the skies over New Jersey and elsewhere around the country is nothing more than the free market providing drones properly equipped for night flight and individuals choosing to get properly licensed to fly them. We've all seen some of those beautiful drone video shots of landscapes and other scenery. Until now, they're all been day time videos. Now there's going to be night videos as well. But night videos of Yellowstone Park aren't going to be that interesting. Night videos of cities - that's going to look good.
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Nice and tight, nothing to see here, nothing to worry about, all is well....
Oh wait, some drones go dark when approached. That indicates evasion and concealment. Why?
No. of Recommendations: 13
Oh wait, some drones go dark when approached. That indicates evasion and concealment. Why?
Occam's razor: because all these "drones" are people mistaking airplanes, stars, and other ordinary objects in the night sky for drones. And sometimes - by sheer chance - these objects will pass behind a cloud shortly after being seen by a person. That won't happen often, but in a large enough population (now primed to "Watch the Skies!"), it will happen, and they will go on social media.
Far more likely than someone being advanced enough to design a drone with the technical capabilities to scan the entire field of vision of the ground and be able to tell when someone's eyeballs have shifted to look at them - at night! - and sense that and be able to react immediately to "conceal".....but too dumb to just not put lights on it in the first place!!!!
Seriously! If someone didn't want the drone to be seen, they wouldn't put lights on it in the first place!! Or they'd just keep them off! Or they just wouldn't have them face downward!!
No. of Recommendations: 1
Seriously! If someone didn't want the drone to be seen, they wouldn't put lights on it in the first place!! - albaby
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That is a good point and the best explanation I have heard so far.
That aside for the moment, what do you think of the FAA's recent temporary drone ban over parts of NYC and NJ? Toothless or useful in some way that doesn't require enforcement or ?
No. of Recommendations: 1
Why?
Because reports from dumb, panicky people are unreliable. Or the remote pilot is unlicensed and doesn’t want to get caught.
But I’m sticking with my go-to. It’s aliens.
—Peter
No. of Recommendations: 2
what do you think of the FAA's recent temporary drone ban over parts of NYC and NJ?Performative theater made necessary by an irrational populace rather than by any threat.
There are also a bunch of slightly sensitive sites that probably should have had a no-drone area around them already. Things like FAA flight navigation aids and electric substations, for example.
Here’s a quick discussion of the small no fly zones for drones. The video should start at 3:33, but I had to manually add the time stamp, so typos are always a possibility.
https://youtu.be/fYoyqkda2js?si=EHzjRw_ikvsktFs-&t...—Peter
No. of Recommendations: 2
Seriously! If someone didn't want the drone to be seen, they wouldn't put lights on it in the first place!! Or they'd just keep them off!
Smuggling 101: run dark
Drug traffickers have been using common drones at night to ferry narcotics across the border. They kinda know that lights are no bueno.
Drug and human traffickers run pangas from Mex to US beaches unlit, with tarps on top of people/cargo to defeat the downlooking IR on the drones we have race-tracking at night offshore.
No. of Recommendations: 6
That aside for the moment, what do you think of the FAA's recent temporary drone ban over parts of NYC and NJ? Toothless or useful in some way that doesn't require enforcement or ?
Well, as you might have guessed from my earlier post, I think all of this is just nonsense - irrational people seeing stuff in the sky, guessing that it's something weird, posting on social media, and getting everyone worked up. So anything the FAA does in response to this is useless, because there's no real problem to be addressed here.
Moving past that, this will certainly have some effect. Most people want to follow the law. Most people who operate drones would prefer not to be in trouble with the FAA. And because of the way numbers work, most of the drone flights will be done by people who do drone flights frequently - and frequent drone users are probably doing so for business or professional or serious hobbyist reasons, and really would prefer not to be on FAA's bad side. So yes, a lot of drone flyers will probably follow the temporary ban, even if FAA doesn't devote a ton of resources to it.
Some won't, obviously. Some won't know about it (it's new, irregular, and ad hoc). Some won't care. Some will deliberately go out into those areas, for the frisson of being a "bad boy" or because they now want to stir up trouble.
So it will reduce the number of drones, but won't eliminate them. Whether that's "useful" is an exercise for the reader....
No. of Recommendations: 3
Well, as you might have guessed from my earlier post, I think all of this is just nonsense - irrational people seeing stuff in the sky, guessing that it's something weird, posting on social media, and getting everyone worked up. So anything the FAA does in response to this is useless, because there's no real problem to be addressed here.
I hope it at least forestalls the inevitable "The drones are kidnapping the dogs and cats in NJ so that illegal immigrants can eat them for the holidays!"
No. of Recommendations: 1
There are also a bunch of slightly sensitive sites that probably should have had a no-drone area around them already.
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Don't veer off into there are some sites where drones should be banned. No shit. I agree with you there.
You keep missing the central question, "What good is a ban if there is no capacity to enforce it, especially when a would be violator knows that you cannot enforce it.
If there is some benefit, please explain it slowly so that my feeble MAGA mind can grasp the mechanism by which that benefit occurs.
No. of Recommendations: 2
Yeah, it’s always the population that’s at fault.
https://nypost.com/2024/12/21/us-news/coast-guards...There are some very irate Coast Guardsmen down in Barnegat Light, New Jersey.
Federal officials have shrugged off accounts from U.S. Coast Guard members that their 47-foot-long rescue vessel was trailed by a fleet of 12 to 30 drones while patrolling the Atlantic Ocean earlier this month — and that’s not sitting well with the sailors who witnessed the mystery swarm.
“It’s the implication that’s insulting,” said the Coast Guard member, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “It’s implying we’re making sh-t up, when the ones making up sh-t are down in Washington, D.C.”He’s probably making it up.
The sailor spoke to The Post days after the FAA imposed temporary flight restrictions over parts of New Jersey and New York. He said he was one of the 12 crewmembers on the boat that night.
“We were actually out there to see if we could spot any drones, because of all these sightings,” he explained. “Well, we found some drones. Or more accurately, they found us.”
No. of Recommendations: 4
What good is a ban if there is no capacity to enforce it
What good are speed limits if there are insufficient police forces to enforce the limits?
What good are tax laws if parts of Congress won’t fund enforcement?
The answer to all three is that we rely on voluntary compliance to a very great degree in this country.
Specifically for drones, the no fly zones are mainly enforced by the drones themselves. Drones are required to have GPS geofencing that keeps them out of restricted areas. These new no fly areas need to be added to the database and, once updated to the drone, that will keep the legal drones out of no fly areas.
—Peter
No. of Recommendations: 4
“Well, we found some drones. Or more accurately, they found us.”
Most accurately, they were making shit up. Or seeing what they wanted to see.
12 to 30 drones? You can't do better than that? That's an awfully big spread. If you're looking for drones, you might be inclined to start counting them at some point.
And where exactly were you? Light drones have a limited range - maybe up to 5 miles or so. And you're sitting in a well stocked Coast Guard vessel. Certainly it has radar. If you're more than 5 miles off shore, the drone operator needs to be on a boat. Wouldn't that show up on your radar?
Of course the Feds shrugged off this nonsense account. If it was a long string of "drones" they saw - one after the other following roughly the same route - they were looking at airplanes crossing the Atlantic. Those planes follow prescribed paths across the ocean to stay organized and keep from running into each other out over the ocean.
--Peter
No. of Recommendations: 2
Most accurately, they were making shit up. Or seeing what they wanted to see.
Because Coast Guardsmen are known for making shit up. All the time.
No. of Recommendations: 3
Because Coast Guardsmen are known for making shit up. All the time.
When away from their area of expertise, they're no better or worse than anyone else. And they're just as subject to the conspiracy theory of the day.
--Peter
