And back to the topic, an RPV such as this or any other should be utilized by L.E.A.'s in the same manner as an occupied aircraft, with the same legal limitations. No snooping for snooping's sake. The limited range of the R.C. equipment will help with...
I would hope the FAA enact some regulations on "commercial" (anything non-hobbyist) use of RC aircraft, and that Congress does the same. I can understand their use in incident awareness and safety, but municipal or HOA snooping, paparazzi, or other uncharted waters around privacy or unlawful search would be an issue (caveat: I'm not a lawyer, not even close).
KB2VXA said:
I say limited because of limited operational range, the ground operator would have to be close by plus it only has a daylight camera or FLIR, not both due to weight restrictions. No way a Night Sun can even be considered. Still like robots already in use it has a practical application.
There's no reason why these things can't be extended range. Don't just look at it from the 26/51/72/440 MHz control standpoint. Near-zero latency can be achieved from low-Earth orbital satellites. There's a ton of them above us. We also have ubiquitous broadband being deployed both commercially and in the incipient stages for public safety. With some AI features, these things could be programmed with a basic flight plan, some if:then scenarios, and then return following their sortie without ever being touched or communicated with by anyone until they're ready to be refueled or serviced.
There's also no reason why these can't be scaled-back airframes from production models. 1/3 scale helicopters could carry sufficient equipment to power FLIR, illumination, and video, not to mention ALPRS, facial recognition, and whatever else could be jammed in without having to carry 300 - 500# of human freight. They'd be cheaper. A non-human payload might mean they could also scale back maintenance. Fly around, gather intel, and alert on detection. No one owns the airspace over your property. Ahhh, technology!
I don't consider myself a tinfoil hat guy, but just to give yall's the warm Thursday fuzzies, what would happen if a large private venture wanted to provide UAV patrol services to municipalities, like red light cameras, where the company deploys the cameras and shares (usually a relatively small) percentage of it's revenue with the municipality? It would be one thing getting a ticket from a police officer who observed something, but what about from a contractor? What would happen if the contractual agreement stated the imagery and other data collected was the property of the private entity and could be sold at their pleasure. Can't be done? Websites and various Internet marketers are already doing this. Just ask Google Adsense, Google Analytics, Quantcast, and VigLink. Deductive and inferential statistics are their core business. And then think about that combined with even more layers of data. And, what might the mayor and council of a cash-strapped community do with staffing levels when presented with an out-sourced solution that reduces headcount and future pension pay-outs but still maintains field presence?
Guys, this could be a plausible scenario. Maybe not now, but someday if we don't press our legislators. I'll shut up now. I suppose I've strayed off topic a little.
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