Video of quadcopter with .22 causes unnecessary panic

Written by Isaac Sloan

As an avid model aircraft enthusiast many people have contacted me about my opinion on the recent video of a quadcopter carrying a .22 handgun. My standard response has been, “I really wished people wouldn’t do that as it makes responsible gun and quadcopter owners look bad and could result in poorly designed fear based  cregulations.” In order to put this into context, let me fill you in on my history with small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (sUAV).

I started building model aircraft 16 years ago but got back into it in 2010. At this time, multicopters (the class of sUAV often referred to as “drones” by those not in the hobby), were quite a bit harder to build. My first multicopter was a 550mm-size hexacopter made out of fiberglass reinforced plastic and took me about three months to order all the parts from various Chinese resellers and carefully assemble and program it. I was immediately aware that 10” carbon fiber blades spinning at up to 14000 rpms were dangerous and avoided flying close to people or over crowds. I got the impression that most people flying model aircraft even just five years ago had mostly been doing it for years and had a healthy respect for safety. I was the reckless one in their eyes for flying outside of parks specifically set up for flying.

For the first couple years, most people would see my hexacopter and come over and talk about it. They’d ask me how much it cost, how hard to fly it was, and sillier questions like how high it could go. After that, quadcopters became really easy to get with the release of the DJI Phantom, and everyone with $400 or more to spend on a fancy toy began flying, many without any training. Most of these people were also respectful, but some of the quadcopters ended up falling into crowds or hitting people while filming weddings. News networks started to speculate about people using “drones with cameras” to invade people’s privacy. Most people in the know were quick to point out that using a loud buzzing machine that could barely keep a GoPro in the air for six minutes wouldn’t be ideal for spying and that in most situations, someone with a camera on the sidewalk would be much more invasive, but the damage had already been done. “Drones” had been defined as annoying evaders of privacy. A small town in Colorado started issuing hunting licenses and bounties for shooting down “drones.”

After this point, many of the people I ran into while flying at Snow Canyon Overlook, Chuckawalla, other unpopulated areas around town, and a few paid real estate shoots started making joking—and sometimes serious—threats about shooting it down. I remember a guy jokingly asking, “Do you work for Obama? Too bad I forgot my shotgun.” Another guy quite seriously told me that if he saw it anywhere near his neighborhood, he would shoot it down. I remember thinking that even in jest, it was quite rude. Who would jokingly threaten to shoot someone’s dog, car or other piece of property? After the last couple years, I’ve almost become used to continuous barbs that I must work for the NSA or that someday I’d get it shot down and learn my lesson. During none of this was I actually flying over someone’s house or even remotely violating their privacy.

So anyway back to the issue at hand.

Drones with guns are scarier than guns or drones alone, and drones are scarier than guns. At least that seems to be the opinion of the citizens of Facebook. I’ve had to remind a few people that drones with guns don’t kill people, people with drones with guns do and that it takes a good drone with a gun to stop a bad drone with a gun. Laws against drones carrying guns won’t stop criminal drones from carrying guns, which brings up the next question: Is this even legal? While the FAA does clearly state that mounting a weapon on a civilian aircraft is illegal, they are currently discussing whether that actually applies to a four-pound toy that is two feet off the ground. We’ll see.

It’s definitely not safe, but how scary is this really? Clearly something could go wrong, and stray bullets are nothing to be laughed at, but as far as someone actually using this technology to commit a crime, I don’t think we should worry. Anyone who has ever shot a handgun knows how hard it is hitting a target at a distance, let alone while said-handgun is mounted on a shaky quadcopter. Anyone using an aircraft like this is still limited by line of site for radio control, and radio signals can be traced back to the source. Not to mention how loud these things are. Using a rifle at 200, 600 or 1000 yards would be much easier to plan out and get away with.

I wish this video of the quadcopter with the .22 wasn’t posted on the internet, but it does seem that the kid planned it out and had quite a bit of experience with both guns and quadcopters. Nobody got hurt, and in reality, this isn’t much different than a bunch of kids out shooting squirrels. Hopefully nobody takes this idea and does something worse with it. In the meantime, I’ll continue to fly my UAVs safely and hope that this incident doesn’t spawn anymore “anti-drone” rhetoric.