Citizens shoot down Animal rights group drone

Citizens shoot down Animal rights group drone

thetandd.com

A remote-controlled aircraft owned by an animal rights group was reportedly shot down near Broxton Bridge Plantation Sunday.
Steve Hindi, president of SHARK (SHowing Animals Respect and Kindness), said his group was preparing to launch its Mikrokopter drone to video what he called a live pigeon shoot on Sunday when law enforcement officers and an attorney claiming to represent the privately-owned plantation near Ehrhardt tried to stop the aircraft from flying.

(visit the link for the full news article)

The drone was being used in a spying application. It starts the public debate of "a reasonable expectation of privacy from drone spying". These animal rights activists should just suck up the loss and stay away from South Carolina Hunters. LOL!
Seems the objective of stopping the legal hunt was accomplished by their own admission prior to the decision to "launch" the MK anyway. If something like this ends up in court which it undoubtedly will, the outcome will most likely not be favorable towards the use of SUAS vehicles filming over private property without the owners consent.Then again activist groups generally are not concerned with law if it stands in the way of their agenda, but of course responsible operators will be burdened with the outcome. Look for more of these unfriendly encounters in the future.

They also might re-think the choice of camera platform, say something not so slow and easy to hit? Just can't help but get a chuckle out this. BTW, harassment of legal hunting activities is illegal in most U.S states.


thetandd.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

How high does one own the "private property" because by that standard most aerial photography would then be banned? These guys are pretty smart using that technology like that. Perhaps they should consider more powerfull UAV with a tele lens next time.

[add] According to that article they were not even on private property. So they are in the clear. What a bunch of idiot shooters thought.

Originally posted by PsykoOps
How high does one own the "private property" because by that standard most aerial photography would then be banned? These guys are pretty smart using that technology like that. Perhaps they should consider more powerfull UAV with a tele lens next time.

[add] According to that article they were not even on private property. So they are in the clear. What a bunch of idiot shooters thought.

edit on 17/2/2012 by PsykoOps because: add

Sue the morons for damages and psychological trauma. Prime example of allowing a primate to own a weapon.

Not use about the USA, but in many places the minimum height for flight is 1000 ft above a built up or urban area, or 500 ft above a rural area.

that is feet above GROUND level - not above the highest building, and is for aircraft.

And even 1000 ft is not actually very far - about 8 x the wingspan of a 737.

However at the moment there is no law covering use of drones at all in the USA - but I think there is an upper limit for something the be considered a RC aircraft - again I know in other jurisdictions it is 7.5kg - which can be quite large and plenty big enough to carry good cameras - and they are not allowed to operate ABOVE a specified height - 250 ft rings a bell.

If this was not actually illegal then I think the protestors will have a case against whoever shot down their equipment.

And even if the flight was illegal I suspect they will have a case anyway for destruction of private property.

reply to post by Aloysius the Gaul

And even if the flight was illegal I suspect they will have a case anyway for destruction of private property.

Everyone is so damn sue happy, it is pathetic....

Sorry Atg, not trying to sound brutal, but I believe if they were spying,,,,then they got busted.......it was settled.....

They should be glad that they only had their little toy shot down.......

That does not really sound like lawsuit material to me....................

LJ01 believes that too much time is spent on "the animals", all while people are struggling just to make it.......

Just my opinion of course

By the way,,,,,,,,,, I have a dog, cat, and fish

Originally posted by liejunkie01
reply to post by Aloysius the Gaul

 

And even if the flight was illegal I suspect they will have a case anyway for destruction of private property.

Everyone is so damn sue happy, it is pathetic....

Sorry Atg, not trying to sound brutal, but I believe if they were spying,,,,then they got busted.......it was settled.....

Dunno about the spying bit tho - if you are shooting game then what is it that is secret that means there is spying going on??

reply to post by Aloysius the Gaul



Charges may be filed but I doubt anyone will be prosecuted. If they can identify who shot it, all the hunter has to say is the thing was flying erratically and thought it might crash into someone so I shot it down. If it goes to court and I am quite sure a South Carolina jury will side with the hunters.

This group must not have a very good since of self preservation, it seems like there strategy here is lets make people with guns angry. Unless they wanted an incident for PR to their cause. If they keep trying these stunts someone may get shot.

Originally posted by liejunkie01
reply to post by Aloysius the Gaul

 

And even if the flight was illegal I suspect they will have a case anyway for destruction of private property.

Everyone is so damn sue happy, it is pathetic....

Sorry Atg, not trying to sound brutal, but I believe if they were spying,,,,then they got busted.......it was settled.....

They should be glad that they only had their little toy shot down.......

That does not really sound like lawsuit material to me....................

LJ01 believes that too much time is spent on "the animals", all while people are struggling just to make it.......

Just my opinion of course

By the way,,,,,,,,,, I have a dog, cat, and fish

Liberalism is a disease, so when you hear this 'sue him, her, it' you're just hearing hot air words as the symptoms.

To fly something, anything, over a bunch of guys that shoot flying things for fun...

They could not foresee what would happen?

Hey Earl, whats that, I got it, BANG, BANG, yuk yuk yuk.

Hunters 1, Environmentalists Wacos 0

I can understand why some would take issue with a pigeon shoot but seriously what a waste of time/resources for this group. May as well go protest Home Depot for selling rat traps. Damn guys go volunteer at an animal shelter or something. Be productive. It may not be as flashy as spying on people with a remote control helicopter but you'll be doing WAY more good.

If your spying on people that aren't breaking the law??? I guess I'm just missing the point. Stupid is as stupid does flying a helicopter over a bunch of people shooting in the air anyway doesn't sound like the best plan to me anyway

It's funny how "animal rights" activists are ready to blame sportsmen for the shrinking populations of some species. these activists need to be told to get off their collective @$$ and get a real jobs. They can take their starbucks coffee and shove it. Sportsmen are the the original conservationist/ wildlife caretakers refer to the Pittman- Robertson Act. Thank you and make every shot count boys!

Originally posted by Domo1
I can understand why some would take issue with a pigeon shoot but seriously what a waste of time/resources for this group. May as well go protest Home Depot for selling rat traps. Damn guys go volunteer at an animal shelter or something. Be productive. It may not be as flashy as spying on people with a remote control helicopter but you'll be doing WAY more good.

Great post.

I always figured that if a group like that wanted to help keep birds alive, they should go picket at KFC, McDonalds or Chick-Fi-Let.

Originally posted by Surfrat
It's funny how "animal rights" activists are ready to blame sportsmen for the shrinking populations of some species. these activists need to be told to get off their collective @$$ and get a real jobs. They can take their starbucks coffee and shove it. Sportsmen are the the original conservationist/ wildlife caretakers refer to the Pittman- Robertson Act. Thank you and make every shot count boys!

Tons of sportsmen that don't even hunt support wildlife through ammo purchases. I know a lot of competitive shooters that don't hunt, whether they shoot skeet, IPSC or cowboy shoots.

reply to post by PsykoOps


Depends on the municipality .. most places it's only like 50-100 feet above the highest point of your property (like the top of your house). Above that it's considered public space. But I think in this case, purposeful spying with an unmanned object would be considered a violation of privacy by reasonable expectation of privacy. The hunters or whoever they were can site the cases won against Google Maps when they lost a few lawsuits regarding pictures taken from a public street exposing individuals on their private property. It was ruled a violation of privacy.

reply to post by jrod


" Charges may be filed but I doubt anyone will be prosecuted. If they can identify who shot it, all the hunter has to say is the thing was flying erratically and thought it might crash into someone so I shot it down. If it goes to court and I am quite sure a South Carolina jury will side with the hunters. "



Or....... Just Claim they were Shooting at Pigeons and Missed....................

reply to post by Surfrat


SHARK may have had an inkling of what could happen but I think that they may have underestimated the public response if they wanted a mechanical martyr. Flying it over a pigeon shoot after publically announcing it practically guaranteed its demise and only brought bemused responses.
Had the locals escaped with the carcass, they would have provided a video of gutting, hanging, plucking, preparing, and then deep-frying it and sent some of the breaded and fried parts to the local paper. My expectation is that future pigeon shoot announcements will be made just to lure in the drones for some real sport....drone hunting.

Maybe that is SHARK's real plan.

The Pigeon shooters should have just stayed and went ahead with the hunt. That drone would not have lasted a minute and it would have just been an oops sorry shouldn't have put your drone up in the sky with all those pigeons and people shooting at them.

reply to post by Surfrat


What is a live pigeon shoot? Does anyone care? Is there a reason people shouldn't shoot pigeons?
Maybe they were just brain dead activists that heard some gun enthusiasts discuss shooting pigeons and being animal rights idiots jumped to animal pigeons rather than clay pigeons