Why can't they shoot these drones out of the sky, making so many peoples lives a misery. Surely they can lock on to the menace Drones and put them right out if action , obviously still search for the stupid idiots doing this.
You can't shoot skyward in a populated area, what goes up must come down.
Jammers have been available for some time but there are ways round them.
The better answer would be to have radio direction finders at airports which could pinpoint the location of the transmitter nearly instantaneously. This would also be useful against the idiots that try and jam aeronautical radio and radar frequencies as well.
Well just heard on news that they are considering shooting down the drone if it's safe to do so.. Not before time I say.
Why wouldn't it be safe to do so.. They can shoot anything else, including flying ducks, geese. Why would this be any different if aircraft aren't moving ?.
Because when you fire a bullet into the air, it comes down almost as fast as it goes up. If it happened to hit - say - you, granny, in the head it would kill you,
I actually think drones are going to be very difficult to stop. They are not always radio controlled and can fly autonomously using inertial guidance or GPS or both., so 'jamming' the control signals is not always possible.
They can fly at an altitude of a couple of feet, hopping over obstacles like perimeter fences so are almost impossible to detect with radar or anything else.
And it is not just aircraft who are vulnerable. Just imagine the carnage an attack on the terraces of a big football match using drones carrying nail bombs would cause. Or an attack on an electricity substation? Or a theatre. Or an office building.
I doubt whether banning them is likely to be effective. They are not very difficult to build, using readily available components, and I am quite sure that terrorists are able to build them.
That they are an effective weapon against us is demonstrated by the fact that all the king's horses and all the king's men seem incapable of stopping just one of them paralysing Gatwick!
Well just heard on news that they are considering shooting down the drone if it's safe to do so.. Not before time I say.
Why wouldn't it be safe to do so.. They can shoot anything else, including flying ducks, geese. Why would this be any different if aircraft aren't moving ?.
As stated above, its in a populated area, what happens to the bullet if it misses or goes through the drone. As far as I am aware they do not shoot birds at any major airport they have other measures to resolve the issues.
Also the runways have to be kept clear of FOD so every time they shot one down near a runway they would have to do a sweep..
Shooting it down may be a temporary solution taking the above into account but they obviously need a more permanent and flexible solution. The solution has to prevent the drone from arriving in the airfield to prevent delays, its no use stopping it after it has arrived.
Well, if they are so bad why were they allowed to be sold to the public anyway ? It's only a matter of time before these new technologies are used for ulterior motives. They know the problems and anticipate that everyone will behave accordingly, and when they don't then they have a problem because they don't; know how to handle a bad situation. The whole country is crazy with too many graduates thinking that their degree is 100% better than common sense. They don't even come up trumps with general knowledge these days or how to run a bath.
If the Government had licensed these things from day one they would not be as profuse and hence would be considerably dearer which would limit a lot of the simpler abuse.
There are still no regulations of their physical design, these things can have blades whizzing around at up to 50,000 rpm and the only restriction is the overall weight of the machine with no requirement to shield the propellers.
Shooting them down does not catch the culprit which is probably at least as important as stopping them flying. Clearly there must be preventative measures put into place to stop drones entering any areas where they can upset normal life.This will be a real wake up call for the government and let's just hope it is not too late to close the stable door.
Well they'll have to do something to stop these drones, as said it chills me to think if what they could do with the things. Apparently you can get something that sends out some kind of barrier which stops it operating when hits it . This is being used in some countries and it's invented in Britain , a guy on the news was talking about it. Also some countries are using birds of prey to grab them , must admit that sounds abit hit and miss to me. They have missiles that lock on to objects ( remember scud missiles) and they explode on impact with whatever , surely a small version of this could be used over the airfield where it's open and not populated obviously you would have to be very precise about where it hit but the technology must be out there . Maybe I'm talking rubbish , just thinking out loud.
I fail to see how a 30-40cm drone can bring down a plane either taking off or landing??
Passenger planes weigh between 50 to 300 tons and a drone perhaps 5 kilos maximum. If a large bird of prey was flying around Gatwick would they close it for 36 hours??
To me, it's health and safety taken to ridiculous levels................
Gatwick open again. Thinking out aloud is good, Cools. It means we can be honest, even if we consider our own thoughts to be rubbish, they're better than no thoughts at all !
I do think that the 'drone' driver' had stamina... what was it from 07.30hrs to 22.00 hrs ? Maybe more than one person. I wonder what might happen to the idea of Amazon using them for delivery of parcels to homes ?
Sometimes Granny , well lots of times in my opinion technology is causing so many problems and dangers that I wish we could backtrack and live a much more simple life , it truly baffles me this new age , old - - - - that I am ,ha.
1 Make the manufacturers put some identifying number on them or the parts needed to build one that would make it possible to know who had bought one at point of sale. ID or passport needed to buy one. 2 Station an RAF helicopter or a jet on stand by to then try to capture one or put it down and see if it can show who bought it. 3 Change the law to prosecute anyone doing certain things with drones as potential acts of terrorism and give them very tough sentences. 4 If possible recall those that are capable doing this to install some id on
A bit late now the genie is out of the bottle, this should have been sorted out years ago, the government knew the potential these drones had in the hands of terrorists and criminals yet allowed them to be sold without safeguards, not even a licence which would have at least given a clue or an address to the owners, it shows how unprepared we are to deal with this kind of technology, would be terrorists must feel heartened that they have a method that has the potential to be remotely operated that can cause death and mayhem and is readily available on line or in a shop.
Brother flying to Greece today from Gatwick been told only a 40 minute delay , which doesnt sound bad considering the turmoil there. How does it work if your flight was cancelled. Do they try to put more flights on? Must be a logistical nightmare with people booked on flights everyday.
Its not the impact to the plane, its if the done flies into the engine that could effectively bring the plane down. As a drone user myself I am sure the person/s responsible are well aware of areas they are not permitted to fly in. If the drone over Gatwick was DIY made it may not have GPS so not easily traceable, my drone and many others provide data that can be retrieved by software, new DJI drones I believe are having GPS coordinates built in to stop them flying in restricted areas, most drones however mine included have built in restrictions maximum height of 150 metres for example is one.
Most drone users will know NOT to fly over people, public places or even peoples homes so we are already restricted, but if we all follow the rules then there's no problem except the few who always ruin it for the many.
Any rules or laws put in place such as registering or licensing them or even banning them completely will do nothing but prove an expensive nuisance to most enthusiasts whilst being completely ignored by the odd malicious user. Nevertheless, I suspect such is the intellectual quality of our politicians this is exactly what they will do on the basis that 'Something must be done' even if it is no more effective than painting your buttocks blue.
I think they are a serious threat to conventional military operations in war too. What is not often mentioned is that they are not necessarily radio controlled. They can be entirely autonomous and are capable of proceeding to a preset target, or a heat source such as a human being or a vehicle whilst avoiding obstacles before detonating their payloads. As they can fly at near ground level they are almost undetectable until they are upon you. They can lie in wait like a landmine for days or weeks until triggered by the approach of the enemy and given their low cost, hundreds or thousands could be deployed for the cost of a single cruise missile. You could even air-drop them. I'm not sure if it is even possible to provide protection from a swarm of them attacking from different directions.
They could have a bigger impact on warfare than tanks or even air power.
No, I think it must have been malicious. They had two or three flights over the runway, Tha doesn't seem like an accident.
The problem is that the chaos caused will not be lost on terrorists. Express trains are not immune to attack either. I don't think one of these things coming through the windscreen would do anything for the punctuality of the service, let alone the poor driver.
Expect more of the same. I really don't think the claims of countermeasures are very convincing, but we shall see.
They brought in Israeli technology to deal with this case. Drones are used all the time in warfare in the Middle East. US is particularly good at it as is Israel. Used by the rebels and anti- government supporters..... so where on earth would they be getting them from ? Not too hard to work it out..
Hmm. All pretty fragile structures. I suspect a drone would just jiggle a bit in the unlikely event of a hit, and then carry on unfazed.
As to who is supplying the drones I would guess either Currrys or Amazon. The parts are all pretty standard are available if you want to make your own too.
I fail to see how a 30-40cm drone can bring down a plane either taking off or landing??
Passenger planes weigh between 50 to 300 tons and a drone perhaps 5 kilos maximum. If a large bird of prey was flying around Gatwick would they close it for 36 hours??
To me, it's health and safety taken to ridiculous levels................
A bird or a drone through the engine or windscreen can cause a lot of damage, Some engines won't be able to withstand it, and you'll have to land again. There's videos on Youtube of engines flaming out because an bird ventured into it on take off.
Here is the wing strike, although the damage looks less than a bird strike, it created structural damage to the wing spar not just the skin. This was only a small drone, nowhere near as big as the Gatwick drone.
Either way, a pilot would have to land the plane as quickly as possible, its the leading edge of the wing and you don't want the skin to continue getting ripped off.
Oh dear, it seems now that there may never have been drones at all.
What a shambles this has been, the two had been arrested due to a tip off, apparently the lad accused had been at work all day but the police failed to phone his employer to verify his whereabouts and also he had sold his drone 6 Months earlier, so it looks like a knee jerk reaction by the police grab the nearest collar, who knows what would have happened to them if he had a drone and no alibi, stitch up by the police? the need to show results, it now transpires that maybe there was no drone at all, but its all right it wasn't a terrorist attack, if they cant find the offending drone or drones or the operator how do they know what it was?
Perhaps they really closed the runways because Lord Lucan was seen riding Shergar down the runway but they were struggling to prove the Russian connection so had to come up with another explanation.
