Home owner shoots down Drone. It's Started!

[Tinker]

1.On Sunday, a Kentucky man was arrested after he blasted a small drone out of the sky over his yard. William Merideth says he was protecting his property rights and his privacy.
2.The owner of the $1,800 drone insists he wasn't trying to invade anyone's privacy. He says he was trying to get pictures of a friend's house, and that he kept the drone at a respectful height of 200 feet.
3.Local authorities say Merideth violated laws against shooting guns in the town of Hillview.
4.Merideth may also have run afoul of Federal Aviation Administration regulations, which make it a crime to shoot down aircraft regardless of whether they are manned or unmanned.

While Merideth's vigilante tactics might not be legal, his actions reflected common concerns that drones can threaten privacy. There are currently few federal regulations governing snooping by drones, and it's unclear how a patchwork of state laws will apply to unmanned aerial vehicles. A firearm is probably the wrong way to protect our privacy against invasion by drones, but it remains to be seen whether the law will give property owners better options

[North Shore]

Apparently, his daughter was sunbathing at the time...
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... down-1800/

"If you cross my property line, there's going to be another shooting!" Lol. Great stuff!

[Panama Jack]

"If you cross my property line, there's going to be another shooting!" Lol. Great stuff!

+1

Discharging a firearm into the air in a community is dangerous (what does up, must come down) but I agree with the ire of the property-owner.

P.S.- i doubt a drone is legally classified as an aircraft. If a single seat, <254 pound single-seat flying machine is not an aircraft, then nor is an unmanned drone.

[rigpiggy]

he shot it with a shotgun, pellets coming down would be like being sprinkled with rice at a wedding, hurts if they throw it hard, hell there is a skeet club next to the airport

[Panama Jack]

Thanks for the tip, riggpiggy.

[CID]

These things are becoming a nuisance.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/01/us/drone- ... index.html

[all_ramped_up]

Would have done the same thing I was in his shoes.

Fly it all you want unless it's into the bubble of my backyard!

[Topspin]

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2015 ... n-alleged/

Via telemetry, drone was shot down at an altitude of 250+ feet while in motion. Motion doesn't cease. Does not corroborate the homeowners story of hovering 10 feet over his back yard. On top of this, he fired the shotgun 3 times, you shouldn't miss once trying to hit a hovering drone at 10 feet shooting bird. Finally when the drone people walked over to ask what happened, he threatened to go get his glock.

Unless the drone pilot somehow fabricated his telemetry...

Pilot is certainly wrong, but lunatic neighbour appears to be a grade A asshole.

[JungleMonkey]

That's right the guy controlling the drone is "certainly wrong". I wouldn't call him a pilot.

I agree with the homeowner shooting it down (if it was in his bubble). The gun-toting home-owner thought the perv neighbor was spying on him. However, using a shotgun to do it in city limits was kinda stupid and even dangerous. I think some air cannon that shoots a net would be the ticket. Or a water cannon. Perhaps I will start an anti-drone cannon company

Anybody have some good, safe ideas for shooting down drones without endangering people? I'm all ears.

It looks like these drones will have to be banned within city limits just like guns. I like the idea.

Also, if you've ever been to Kentucky, you will realize that rednecks with shotguns are fairly normal and the person who wrote the news article was obviously hard-up for a story.

[Siddley Hawker]

How about some kind of radio transmitter that can override the operator's controller. All Your Base Belong To Us!

[Nark]

That's right the guy controlling the drone is "certainly wrong". I wouldn't call him a pilot.

I agree with the homeowner shooting it down (if it was in his bubble). The gun-toting home-owner thought the perv neighbor was spying on him. However, using a shotgun to do it in city limits was kinda stupid and even dangerous. I think some air cannon that shoots a net would be the ticket. Or a water cannon. Perhaps I will start an anti-drone cannon company

Anybody have some good, safe ideas for shooting down drones without endangering people? I'm all ears.

It looks like these drones will have to be banned within city limits just like guns. I like the idea.

Also, if you've ever been to Kentucky, you will realize that rednecks with shotguns are fairly normal and the person who wrote the news article was obviously hard-up for a story.

Yeah dude: a Shotgun with #8 shot, exactly as this man did.

A quick search of Google verified my thoughts. #8 is lethal to about 50 meters.

[human garbage]

Via telemetry, drone was shot down at an altitude of 250+ feet while in motion...

Unless the drone pilot somehow fabricated his telemetry...

All I can say is if the reports about him using #8 Bird on it are correct (MSN article), then something doesn't add up there. I'd think the effective range of that ammo would be less than 40 yards let alone 250 feet! EDIT: What ^ he said.

Fabrication is possible. Not like drone guy is going to hand over telemetry and video of him creeping on minor teenage girls sunbathing right?

I'd don't know all the circumstances so I'm not going to judge. If the homeowner was firing toward a safe 'backstop' and drone guy was doing what he alleges, then I lean toward a righteous shoot. Not what I would have done personally though.

I'm going to build a HERF gun for in case the need ever arises to take one down. No discharge bylaws in my city preclude anything else.

[Shiny Side Up]

Anybody have some good, safe ideas for shooting down drones without endangering people? I'm all ears.

Actually, a paintball gun would be reasonably effective at that range, the paint would do a number on any of the lightweight drones that are available, I I survived the impact.

But being more creative, one can look to history for some possible deterrents or anti-drone devices. A cluster of helium ballons might do the trick if guided with a suitable length of string, with a bit of a breeze a kite might be employed as well.

Thinking of something more esoteric, i'd be most tempted to employ a variety of fireworks, or amploy a solution involving model rocketry, a suicide mission for another remote controled device, or possibly one using a trailing streamer to entangle the invading drone.

It is also said that life's greatest pleasure involves Falconry, and if you can use falconry to also crush your enemy, well that's a win-win.

[rigpiggy]

so about 91 yds away, ever patterned a shotgun? roughly 1" spread/yd so a 90" circle is a rough spread. youd be darn lucky to hit a quail let alone kill it at that range. a bird shot at 30 ish yards the pellets very rarely penetrate deeper than a few millimeters. so the question is lethal to what.

[Meddler]

So lessons learned:

1. A shotgun can knockdown some drones at surprisingly long range.
2. Some folks in Kentucky are pretty handy with a scatter gun.
3. Don't fly anything to low across this guys backyard. Or mine.

Btw. A shotgun with any small birdshot pointed up is nt going to hurt anyone around when it comes down. I've been rained on by #4 shot lots of times. Seems like a good solution to me.

[goingnowherefast]

I'm voting for the water cannon. That's if you want to stay within Canada's culture and laws. Everybody has a garden hose in their back yard. Iif you need more power than that, small gas water pumps can throw water pretty far.

[LousyFisherman]

Slingshot with ice cubes. With practise, dead shot up to 30-40 metres
and the evidence melts,

LF

[davecessna]

Robin, hand me the Batjammer™!

[GyvAir]

Sticks and stones..

[GyvAir]

Or, train your raptor: