Drone complaints to cops are up twelvefold in three years The number of UK complaints about drones has shot up twelvefold over the past three years. Police reports about everything from mid-air near misses to irate neighbours squabbling about flights over gardens to criminals flying drugs into prisons were collated by the Press Association newswire agency for 2014-2016. It found …
3000 complaints, wow, what a tizzy, get an air rifle and shoot it down if you really care. 'Thieves using them to check back windows' as against the old fashioned method of walking round the back or peering over a fence... really, panic, moral outrage, hang them all... hang, hang, hang
I find it hard to believe that thieves are using them for reconnaissance. Big buzzy things flying around tend to attact unwanted attention from the neighbours.
Shooting at a drone with an air rifle, even a 12lb springer, would probably get you arrested for firearms offences in the UK. The reason we have such draconian gun laws here is because we have an abundance of morons who do exactly the kind of thing you are suggesting.
Well that will make the old art of fly casting a little more popular... You'd could always buy a low cost robust drone with replaceable parts (sure they exist ) and 'simulate' an air-air crash, 'honest officer, I'm still trying to get the hang of this new technology
"someone in Suffolk complained to police that a drone operator was spying on neighbouring teenage girls sunbathing in their garden"
I notice, not their teenage daughters sunbathing in their gardens, but "neighbouring teenage girls".
Drones disturbing their own "inspections" were becoming a problem?
"someone in Suffolk complained to police that a drone operator was spying on neighbouring teenage girls sunbathing in their garden"
I notice, not their teenage daughters sunbathing in their gardens, but "neighbouring teenage girls".
Drones disturbing their own "inspections" were becoming a problem?
Suffolk? gotta be cousins though. Probably some (several?) other family relationships as well
"Anecdotally I've heard that burglars using drones is a big issue for police forces," Professor David H Dunn told PA. "People are using them to fly behind properties to see if the lights are on, to see what sort of French windows they have or whether there are windows open."
There was a time when we used to have police on the streets at night that I would have said this was a load of rubbish due to the fact the getting gripped and trying to explain why you have a drone would result in a "going equipped" prosecution.
Total and complete garbage. The number of drone related crimes or incidents is so tiny to be completely irrelevant. Number of burglaries preceded by someone walking past a house an looking at it : loads. Number of 'joints cased' by drones? Probably zero, or near as. Concentrate on the big issues first, rather than looking at stuff that's new, different and headline grabbing.
Total and complete garbage. The number of drone related crimes or incidents is so tiny to be completely irrelevant.
3456 complaints is a negligible amount. Between Oct 2015 and Sep 2016 there were 3,574,049 victim based crimes reported in the UK. 1,075,511 were violence against people (including 695 homicides), plus 37,813 rapes and 74,208 other sexual offences, 402,048 burglaries, 548,674 criminal damage and arson offences. There were even more than 25 bicycles reported stolen (87,470) for every complaint about a drone.
Oct '15 to Sep '16 crime statistics are in https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/crimeandjustice/bulletins/crimeinenglandandwales/yearendingsept2016/pdf
You got that right. No one says boo about drones killing their targets, and also ones missing and hitting the unlucky, in war zones. But when some granny phones into the tit-heads that she saw a drone hovering near a lady's boobs; then the morons come unglued! Look at the stats for real crimes, weigh the evidence, then weigh anchor because there are far more important things happening in the world than some titty-drone crimes, me old fruit.
If you have a shotgun license, then your allowed to have a shotgun. If you have a FireArms Certificate then your allowed pretty much anything from small arms from .22 up through .303 or 7.62, or even black powder cannon that you can demonstrate a reasonable cause for owning, although good luck storing a 24 pounder in the mandated gun cabinet and getting stopped with a cannon and powder tends to lead to interesting and very protracted discussions with the Police according to reenactors I have talked to with this sort of artillery.
You are allowed to shoot on your own property, which is frequently exercised by people out in the country, who will happily pot pests such as rabbits, foxes and burglars. The latter tends to cause some public outrage however (see Tony Martin) as your required to use "reasonable force" which should be proportionate to the threat. Shooting people is generally seen to be a bit extreme, given that our criminals won't be armed. Hells, our terrorists aren't generally armed with more than a carving knife.
I should note however, that any license holder firing live ammunition in a town is unlikely to remain a license holder for long due to public attitudes on firearms, which could largely be summed up as "out of sight, out of mind" and the general public is apt to get very severely upset when firearms are discharged in towns. The real question would be "would you lose your liense via being shot by the police reponse" when our version of a SWAT team turns up with twitchy trigger fingers, or just losing the license when either the police or your shooting club finds out you discharged a round in a residential area.
Suffice to say that blowing away drones with a shotgun is not likely to happen over this side of the pond.
"good luck storing a 24 pounder in the mandated gun cabinet"
Good luck to the police in removing said cannon when they are directed to where it's stored (chained to the garage rafters, the back wall, the side wall and locked inside a brick outhouse as the one I helped crew was kept). Funnily, the officers who attended that call saw the funny side and just nodded and called it in as 'secure'. The ones who went to check one musket, however, were somewhat confused and then baffled as to why bother: The cabinet was bolted to the back wall of an Air Force Armoury, behind locks, armed guard and past the rather modern firearms that were not licensed through the police...
"Tony Martin"
To clarify: He was charged with murder (reduced to manslaughter) for shooting and killing a burglar with an illegal shotgun (A pump action shotgun of a type not allowed in the UK, even with a license) when he'd already lost his shotgun license (he lost his license in 1994, killed the burglar in 1999). The police claimed he was lying in wait for the burglars, and the man he killed, he'd shot in the back while the man fled the property.
"Hells, our terrorists aren't generally armed with more than a carving knife."
With which they can be quite effective, although they also use cars, bombs and other impliments. Just not generally guns.
"Suffice to say that blowing away drones with a shotgun is not likely to happen over this side of the pond."
Well, not firearms at least. Not sure how effective a Nerf gun would be, but a paint ball gun might do some damage. Flip side, there are always arrows (if you're any good with a bow), fishing line (as has been suggested) or other impliments, although this being the UK, good old fashioned weather (rain, gusty winds etc) makes drone flight somewhat of a gamble.
Rain... wonder if a super-soaker would hit a drone? That could be an alternative if it could fry the electronics... how do drones fare when soaked?
It's interesting. There are lots of UK Airprox reports from pilots. But none have actually been substantiated to be drones. Ten years ago it would have been a UFO, now even a mylar Spongebob balloon is classified as a 'drone' sighting.
What's most annoying is the headlines like "Aircraft hits drone on approach to Heathrow" are hardly ever followed up with a "Actually it was probably a platic bag" article.
Could be Madam Whiplash* has flexed her whip in that direction.
*AKA Lindi St Clair, head of the UK's Corrective Party, who stood for election to Parliament 11 times. She was a former prostitute and dominatrix who accused the Inland Revenue of living off illegal/immoral earnings as they taxed prostitutes income while prostitution was considered both illegal and immoral at the time.
British proposals for tackling drone misuse potentially include mandatory registration of new devices and new criminal offences for misuse...
And how is that going to help? Any responsible person will be just as responsible as before. The less responsible ones just won't bother registering.
I would go with putting together an air cannon battery that fires tennis balls, especially if I could decorate the top of the house to look like the Death Star or a pirate ship. It would make for a fun project and should not endanger anyone. Adding an air raid siren to the mix might annoy the neighbors, though, so that's definitely got to go into the mix.
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