- Joined
- Feb 13, 2016
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Hi All,
I've been flying manned airplanes quite a bit since August and have discovered that it's best not to mention anything to do with drones to other pilots. Most manned airplane pilots literally hate drones.
I overheard another pilot talking about flying his drone and he was bashed for it.
Seems unfair but most of it comes from ignorance, however, some of it comes from claimed close calls with drones in "Their Airspace", in that case I can't help but to understand their issue with drones if it were true.
I kind of shrugged it off until this week while coming in on final approach for runway 10 at 9A9 (Shiflet Field), it's a grass strip with high terrain in all quadrants, you are literally within 200' of the terrain while on downwind, base and final (at several points) with a 600' a minute descent (required since the pattern should be a little tighter than normal), there's no way to establish anything less than a 10:1 glide ratio for that runway, it requires a 4:1 glide ratio for runway 28 to clear trees at the ends of the runway, fortunately the strip is 3300 ft with a fairly smooth grass so there's plenty of room to land long as long as you use a short field approach procedure and of course that depends on the weight of aircraft you're flying, an LSA would have no problem but I was flying a Cessna 182 Skylane.
On final approach I found myself close enough to a drone to determine that it was an Inspire, I was gliding at about 67 knots (Vref) since I wasn't near maximum gross weight.
The Inspire was just below my left wing and couldn't have been more than 6 or 8 feet from the end of the wing.
We suspected that the operator was flying from a small campground just across the Catawba river from the threshold of the runway.
We sent Law enforcement over there to try to determine who it was but the campground manager said that the guy who was flying it had just left and wasn't registered there as a camper. We can only assume that he came in just to get footage of an airplane coming in for a landing.
It was close enough to the campground that I'm sure he heard us talking about it with raised voices so he bolted out of there.
They did get a description of the car he was driving but no license number and they claimed they didn't know who he was and had never seen him before.
I know that most all of you wouldn't do such a thing and that most all of you follow the rules and are safety minded but to those who think you can do whatever you want since you own it, PLEASE don't fly in manned aircraft's airspace!!!! It could easily cause people to lose their lives.
Fortunately I didn't let it rattle me during my landing and kept I flying the plane to get it landed safely but afterwards, I was very upset!
Please remember that there are lives at stake when you fly near manned aircraft (near airports or out somewhere at altitudes where manned aircraft are allowed to fly). It's true that some manned aircraft fly lower than they should and that's dangerous but please be aware enough to make sure you keep it in sight and avoid manned aircraft at all costs!
Not trying to start any debates or trouble, just trying to do my part to keep drones from getting a bad rap from the few who don't respect the rules or manned aircraft and their pilots.
Thanks,
Joe
I've been flying manned airplanes quite a bit since August and have discovered that it's best not to mention anything to do with drones to other pilots. Most manned airplane pilots literally hate drones.
I overheard another pilot talking about flying his drone and he was bashed for it.
Seems unfair but most of it comes from ignorance, however, some of it comes from claimed close calls with drones in "Their Airspace", in that case I can't help but to understand their issue with drones if it were true.
I kind of shrugged it off until this week while coming in on final approach for runway 10 at 9A9 (Shiflet Field), it's a grass strip with high terrain in all quadrants, you are literally within 200' of the terrain while on downwind, base and final (at several points) with a 600' a minute descent (required since the pattern should be a little tighter than normal), there's no way to establish anything less than a 10:1 glide ratio for that runway, it requires a 4:1 glide ratio for runway 28 to clear trees at the ends of the runway, fortunately the strip is 3300 ft with a fairly smooth grass so there's plenty of room to land long as long as you use a short field approach procedure and of course that depends on the weight of aircraft you're flying, an LSA would have no problem but I was flying a Cessna 182 Skylane.
On final approach I found myself close enough to a drone to determine that it was an Inspire, I was gliding at about 67 knots (Vref) since I wasn't near maximum gross weight.
The Inspire was just below my left wing and couldn't have been more than 6 or 8 feet from the end of the wing.
We suspected that the operator was flying from a small campground just across the Catawba river from the threshold of the runway.
We sent Law enforcement over there to try to determine who it was but the campground manager said that the guy who was flying it had just left and wasn't registered there as a camper. We can only assume that he came in just to get footage of an airplane coming in for a landing.
It was close enough to the campground that I'm sure he heard us talking about it with raised voices so he bolted out of there.
They did get a description of the car he was driving but no license number and they claimed they didn't know who he was and had never seen him before.
I know that most all of you wouldn't do such a thing and that most all of you follow the rules and are safety minded but to those who think you can do whatever you want since you own it, PLEASE don't fly in manned aircraft's airspace!!!! It could easily cause people to lose their lives.
Fortunately I didn't let it rattle me during my landing and kept I flying the plane to get it landed safely but afterwards, I was very upset!
Please remember that there are lives at stake when you fly near manned aircraft (near airports or out somewhere at altitudes where manned aircraft are allowed to fly). It's true that some manned aircraft fly lower than they should and that's dangerous but please be aware enough to make sure you keep it in sight and avoid manned aircraft at all costs!
Not trying to start any debates or trouble, just trying to do my part to keep drones from getting a bad rap from the few who don't respect the rules or manned aircraft and their pilots.
Thanks,
Joe