The unconfirmed report is that a “company survey” aircraft impacted a small UAS at 2,500 feet near Lewis University (KLOT) on August 27, 2015 causing damage to the leading edge of the manned aircraft wing.
More as we get it but this is what we know
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Whatever it was, it looks like it would have had to come through the prop to make that strike on the leading edge of the elevator.
I have seen many birdstrikes, and that does not look like the usual damage pattern I have experienced. Birds hit a plane all over the place. Nose, tail, props, wings, nacelles, windscreens, side of plane etc... It just depends on the angle the two meet in the air. To hit the tail is not abnormal, it just does not happen as often as other places on the aircraft. Birdstrikes are more common than the numbers show. It wouldn't be hard to get a fixed wing plane to fly up to 2500 feet. Many of those guys can fly easily for over 30 minutes and some even past an hour. Unless someone cleaned it up, it was most likely not a bird. They leave a mess and some pretty telling splat marks behind.
Hi Greg,
I'm not saying that the idiot UAV pilots can't do it, just very few of them do and the normal result is now that they kiss their $1000.00+ investment good bye very quickly.
I wasn't saying it was impossible and certainly if you have some idiot really working at it they can get there.
All I was saying is that statistically this is a tiny number of people a tiny percentage of the time, yet the so called plane sightings are commonly at these extremely unlikely altitudes.
And that is what is seriously unlikely.
I believe I am talking about an astronomically statistically unlikelihood here.
Impossible - no, incredibly unlikely - yes.
Sort of like the Mission Impossible stunts.
Possibly on a par with spontaneous dissociation of all the atoms on earth - OK maybe not quite that unlikely.
Best,
Gary
Gary I do agree with you about the number spotted being way over the top.
Gary the chances this being a commercial drone would be extremely small. I would say a FPV flyer out trying to push the envelop. Even with a DJI 2500ft isn't hard to do. Quick search on YouTube will net you plenty of them above the clouds. After all it knows the way home at least that what those fools that do this rely on. Just like this guy https://youtu.be/rIVMLMT5-30
Time will tell on this one, what I am finding interesting is that its not hit network news over there. You would expect there to have been TV reports by now.
Not saying the damage can't occur in flight, just that it is suspicious it is the tail, not the wings, fuselage or prop which have a hugely higher likelihood of being involved in an in air strike.
Also, wasn't saying it was necessarily a multi, but in the US there are only a tiny number of fixed wing UAS being flown and the vast majority of those would be below 2500 feet too, for the reasons sighted.
At this point, except for plain old RC airplanes it is almost certainly well below 1% of the "drones" being flown are fixed wing.
And although I understand Ag in particular can benefit from higher overflights of their crop lands, that is still a very small usage and many if not most of those are now being flown as type 333 anyway which would mean they would be either not at that altitude or with filed flight plans.
I stand by my comment that 2500 feet is very suspicious, not that you can't get there, just that almost nobody (at least in the US) purposely flies there and the odds against a plane encounter at that altitude are vanishingly small.
Especially given the relatively large number of so-called sightings at unlikely high altitudes that have occurred - Bah - Humbug!
The Phantom dolts can';t get that high if they try and they rest of us know better.
Best,
Gary
I don't think it was a multi either, and wonder if we will ever really know. I guess they will almost in a Cinderella way see if a prop of a certain size rotating at speed will make those marks, your right about the type as well Greg, it was early in the morning when I received the email. Changed now.
I have seen damage just like this but a bit worse when a Navajo struck a duck while in cruise flight. I know it was a duck because I had to clean it up. So this type of damage is possible in flight. Also this aircraft is an Apache.
When they say it was unknown what they hit, just means they didn't see it. Birds tend to leave bits behind after a strike so they can often be identified.
The problem these days is people are flying FPV at ever increasing distances. Look at this one claiming 80 Km out https://youtu.be/z_PxhU9i9Ng It's the guys that just have to try and press the envelop to see how far and high they can go.
I do find it funny that everyone assumes it was a multirotor.
One further comment, notice the claimed 2500 feet altitude, in fact many of the claimed sightings by commercial pilots have been around this altitude or higher.
Think about it, isn't that in itself really suspicious?
Those of us who actually use these things know you can't even really see your "drone" at tat altitude adequately to control it and a "Phantom" is just a speck.
The percentage of hobby UAS being flown at those altitudes is vanishingly small, sure us DIYDrones guys can do it autonomously or with good FPV, but what percent of the drone users does that account for and we are also the ones who know better than to do so.
I would have a lot easier time believing there might be substance to sightings below 400 feet, but close encounters at 2500 feet and above, something stinks there.
Of course the manned pilots making these claims do not share our knowledge of the practical limitations of them.
For the most part most such real high altitude sightings would be of drones that were simply out of control and no longer communicating with their operator.
And that seems like it would be statistically astronomically unlikely.
I welcome other viewpoints on this, but think about it what percentage of our "drone" fleet is currently at or above 2500 feet - right!
Best Regards,
Gary
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