People like this give me the sh!ts. It's not hard to check what you are allowed to do or not as the case may be, regarding flying remote controlled aircraft. The problem is, they jeopardise the hobby for all of us.
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2180331&page=1446#post31354597
I've come to accept that in life so many people don't think the rules apply to them. Rules just don't need to be followed according to so many but when it affects them well that's different, there should have been rules to protect me...... Sigh. What's worse is that they feel if they didn't know they shouldn't do it, then it shouldn't apply to them.... Really, wow...... I spend a few weeks with the NSW Police in the field and it was an eye opener.
I agree that some of the Quad Racers just don't care, I was particularly concerned when I saw cars actually driving around, so I can only guess that the woolies was open still. It seems that very little risk assessing went into it, hence the reason why model ac arent allowed to fly at night. Some are actually trying to put some safety measures in place and I applaud those people.
It was interesting the responses you got, well such and such was on TV so its ok..... Is that really the way we do things now? TV is our source of truth now?
These guys chose to fly in an open carpark at night, in clear violation of the CASAR Part 101:
Violations I observed:
101.390 - Operating model ac at night - 25 penalty points or 101.095 - also 25 penalty points.
101.395 - Keeping model ac away from people - 50 penalty points
101.055 - Hazardous operation prohibited (since he flew right a a car and then moved off to the side, it could be considered hazardous) - 50 penalty points
So that's max 125 points - or $21,590. Honesty I would say CASA if they bothered and that's a big if, then they would only pursue the operating at night or too close to people and then only give a small component of that, so maybe $500 worth of a fine. The guy in Queensland drew far to much attention to himself, also flew well beyond BVLOS if I'm remembering correctly. That was a good outcome as he sold his gear, so got him out of the hobby all together.
I think you'll find that CASA will investigate if someone brings it to their attention - and dig further if needed, I have doubts they are trolling youtube specifically without someone pointing it out to them. I know they'll say one thing and actually do another, its about perception.
The 30m rule is really hard to maintain - with kids and dogs, I start flying in a park up the road and it's empty. Half way through I get kids arriving and it can be hard to keep them away as they don't understand the risks. It is not odd for me to land and then go if I feel they won't listen, I try to share the park as much as I can. In a recent video I had them about 20m away as that was the best I could do, they were sitting for me so it helped, strictly by the rules I could be in trouble, but I risk assessed it and landed when they started to move again, luckily the parents were really good and said, sorry kids time to go. The way I look at it is that if I throw a prop it can easily travel 10-15m away (or further if I'm unlucky). Now thats only happened twice (both times because I didn't go through the full checks) - I don't cut corners anymore it's not worth it. Also I find it fun at SES we will often get people to stand 10m away from an object (it's out min safe distance for downed power lines) and wow people have such varied view of distance (and not in the safe direction).
Sadly it really boils down to education, like so many of our laws. Sadly your attempt on RCgroups didn't go well. I recently had someone ask well what is allowed on RCGroups. When I replied I had the typical response of 'here we go again' from certain people. Here was someone asking what is it, sure he could have searched but he asked, so I helped. I now have a thread I can point people to if I get asked the same question.
Regards,
Chris
