As someone who has flown RC drones and heli for the better part of 5+ years now I generally find that there are 3 camps: 1) people who have never flown and assume the worst and often want unrealistic "guarantees" (see above), 2) those who fly, fly often and fly as safe as can be "guaranteed", 3) those who fly in an unsafe manner due to inexperience or just general carelessness.
I've always tried to fly responsibly at all times. I am cognizant of weather, people/pets, surroundings and right-of-way in the sky. Nothing in life is guaranteed 99.9999% of the time. Is it OK for me to levy a 99.9999% guarantee on you, that you drive perfect and responsible (no radio, no food, no phone, no talking, no distractions - period)? No. That's not life in general - we don't live in a bubble. Well at least the general population doesn't.
I am fine with sane safety measures put forth... Certifications, registrations, etc. But this is a hobby like many others. People own many kinds of recreational hobby gear that can endanger the operator or surrounding people - yet, they're accepted because people think they understand them. Most don't, however, understand simple engine operation - yet drive cars.
All mechanical vehicles have the guarantee to fail at some point or another and, yes, someone is 100% guaranteed to get hurt at some point in time. But, please don't ruin my hobby because you choose not to understand it.
I've been flying RC for ~16 years, on and off, and the rules for operating an RC aircraft safely have always been the same.
DO NOT FLY NEAR PEOPLE.
It's that simple. No functioning machine can ever be inherently safe, safety is the result of continuous exercise of good judgement. When operating a large nitro powered helicopter, featuring 700mm long carbon fibre knives that spin at 2000rpm, controlled by an imperfect operator, through an imperfect electronics system, powered by an unreliable motor I am aware that it is an intrinsically dangerous object, and I only fly it in controlled areas, without bystanders who could get hurt.
And it annoys me to no end when I see some idiot crashing his DJI into a building (no flying within 400m of a built-up area - don't fly near people), or a new guy with a t-rex or raptor helicopter flying near people in a park in the middle of town (Don't fly near people!) Or someone who should know better like a model aero club member flying over the pits or the viewing area or the carpark (don't fly near/over people!)
I actually want something like the machine described in the article, because I want to be able to film myself skiing, without the horribly cliched helmet cam, but unless I can get something small enough that it CANT hurt someone in a collision, or something with very robust collision avoidance, I can't use it.
Ideally both, because even with perfect collision avoidance, something else could still break.
I fall into camp 3. I have a DJI Phantom that I crashed into my neighbor's yard due to my own incompetence and inexperience.
I'm not arguing for draconian policy measures. I just want manufacturers to focus on and market reliability and safety features. It's a win-win for users and manufacturers.
Manufacturers are clearly aiming for these drones to be everywhere and for everyone to own one. With many, many people flying for the first time everyday there are going to be accidents. If manufacturers can reduce the harm caused by these accidents then they'll have a much easier path for FAA regulations and public acceptance.
For users, they get the ease of mind that crashes won't be catastrophic for their drone and a reduced chance that they'll inadvertently hurt someone.
A strawman might hurt someone if it gets knocked over easily, but we don't see the government stepping in to stop people building them up all the time!
Don't get me wrong, I fully understand the point you are trying to make. The problem I have with it is, it seems by your own admission, you're somewhat hypocritical. You'd like for someone else, a la the manufacturer, to provide a guarantee that you can be lazy and not take precautions so that you don't have to worry about a $1300 radio controlled vehicle that flies doesn't hurt someone else?
I only mention the general cost because - there's not that much margin in these things to achieve what you want. Nobody will spend $2300 on a Phantom if that additional $1000 is for upgrades to safety and ignorance factors.
There are many things that didn't start out with any guarantees of implied safety - and many things that are assumed safe, when not operated safely, are inherently very risky / unsafe.
Finally, there are easily many tens of thousands of hobby grade drones out there - flying daily, operating (for the most part) safely (again partially dependent on operator). How many deaths have occurred to date?
Something that really bothers me is that when I first started flying the general reaction I had was of excitement - although I was generally no less cautious. The RC craft I flew drew interest and excitement from bystanders and it was generally a good experience. Now, I am overly cautious when flying anywhere near public areas. I've received comments about how I should "go somewhere else", even when I was flying in an area where there were no people, but someone decided to seek me out since they saw the craft from remote. And I've generally just tried to stay out of places I know would be potential hazards if there was a malfunction where I lost control.
Do I still fly in "tight" locations? Yes - I do. I've flown my neighborhood to assess storm damage for my neighbors knowing that there are people - but in those situations I always fly with prop guards and try to fly over houses, not over sidewalks or roads. And then there's the artistic side - I like taking shots of architecture and some of those situations require thoughtful planning or waiting for an area to clear.
I can't help other people's ignorance and I will say that you flying untethered with no experience is not something DJI or I should have to worry about - that's your choice and risk to weigh. If I was your neighbor I'd have a frank conversation with you about your actual skills and ability to ascertain risk.
In my opinion golf is far more risky than flying "drones" (I prefer RC quad-copter, but to each their own). I play golf, I love it. I'm not going to stop playing because you hit golf balls off your deck into your neighbors yard and then expect Titleist and Callaway to fix your bad decision.
>I only mention the general cost because - there's not that much margin in these things to achieve what you want. Nobody will spend $2300 on a Phantom if that additional $1000 is for upgrades to safety and ignorance factors.
Well, not that I agree with the need for what he says, but what you describe is easily solved:
People WOULD pay $2300 on a Phantom if the "upgrades to safety and ignorance factors" were compulsory and so every drone on the market had to bear that extra $1000 in its cost.
Some people would, but many others would simply be priced out of the market (and/or build their own from individual components which have none of the required safety upgrades)
I hope that most people flying these things show the same level of care and consideration that you do -- but as the barrier for entry lowers, I doubt that will be the case. I am concerned that as the number of careless casual users increases, the public outrage will be directed at the technology itself rather than the inexperienced pilots.
Is the 'hands-off' recovery not good on the DJI platform? I've always used OpenPilot FCs so have no idea how well the DJI FC works, but the OP hardware will fully recover from stupidity if you let go of the controls (while not in acro mode).
Fail safe works reliably in my experience - but it doesn't save from risky flight in the first place. I think YMMV, but I've yet to have an in-flight failure that resulted in crashing or losing control. That being said I'm overly cautious about inspection and maintenance of the craft I own.
I'm not disillusioned though - it will happen, I'll lose an ESC mid-flight and I'll have to deal with trying to guide an uncontrollable aircraft that I may not have line of sight on. Pretty much next to impossible to guarantee anything in that situation.
But you do require a license to drive around a car, while this "hobby" does not require anything of that sort. Which is why it is questioned a lot. I belong to camp 2 as well, but i can understand why it might be a cause of concern for many.
I won't dispute that, but there are many dangerous hobbies that require no license. I'm also not against the thought of some level of certification or licensing. The problem is that would fall, again, on vendors until the government formulated a universal standard. And while it would be good to help provide better understanding of flight and operation it would likely not do much for failure scenarios.
There are the two similar, but very different scenarios: 1) controller crashes RC aircraft into person because of negligent flying, or 2) loss of control due to hardware failure crashes RC aircraft into person
Both are real scenarios with cars and scenario 2 isn't accounted for during license testing. What people need to understand is that these devices shouldn't be outright banned because of impending accidents. Yes, those will be unfortunate - but the hobby has good recreational and business use cases in my opinion.
I have a drivers license. I can drive a car. However, even I know I'm not the best driver in the world. In fact, I'm probably below average. I just drive so little.
I'll take a drone that flies itself over one controlled by a human any day. Humans suck at this stuff. It should be possible to make it very safe if it's automated.
I've always tried to fly responsibly at all times. I am cognizant of weather, people/pets, surroundings and right-of-way in the sky. Nothing in life is guaranteed 99.9999% of the time. Is it OK for me to levy a 99.9999% guarantee on you, that you drive perfect and responsible (no radio, no food, no phone, no talking, no distractions - period)? No. That's not life in general - we don't live in a bubble. Well at least the general population doesn't.
I am fine with sane safety measures put forth... Certifications, registrations, etc. But this is a hobby like many others. People own many kinds of recreational hobby gear that can endanger the operator or surrounding people - yet, they're accepted because people think they understand them. Most don't, however, understand simple engine operation - yet drive cars.
All mechanical vehicles have the guarantee to fail at some point or another and, yes, someone is 100% guaranteed to get hurt at some point in time. But, please don't ruin my hobby because you choose not to understand it.