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Whats up with the crowd surfing??

Discussion in 'Cinestar 8' started by Cedar Beauregard, May 1, 2013.

  1. Cedar Beauregard

    Cedar Beauregard New Member

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    I have seen a proliferation of these types of shots and its become disturbing to me.. Having seen a few of these hit the ground and the effect it can have on the machine and the earth I can only imagine how devastating it would be in a crowd..

    It didn't bother me to fly over non participating people until I thought of myself and my kids under some other persons heli.. I passed up the below job because they said they wanted the concert shot and I didn't feel comfortable flying over the crowd.. I think we should all be mindful of this before one bad move not only hurts or kills someone but gets all other forms of filming banned in the process.





    What I like to think of when I'm around non-participating people (not in the production) is to visualize a "cone of danger" under the helicopter.. This cone would encompass most mishaps.. So if you want to get close to the crowd just stay low and to the side.. And if you go up go up and out..
     
  2. Gary Haynes

    Gary Haynes Administrator
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    Well said.
     
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  3. Chris Babiana

    Chris Babiana Member

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  4. Brad Meier

    Brad Meier Active Member
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    Ive been asked to do flights near large crowds and one even indoors, instantly denied. One that I did agree on... I told them what I would do is a ratio of 1 to 1. Want a shot 200 ft up? Its going to be 200ft from the group Minimum and really thats not enough. 99% will be fine with your decisions, the ones that push back aren't worth flying for.
     
  5. Andy Johnson-Laird

    Andy Johnson-Laird Administrator
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    Brad: is the presumption that a falling copter will not exceed a "glide angle" of 1:1 (that is 45 degrees) and thus your 1:1 rule is reasonable? I'm not asking to challenge what you say -- I've not seen any data as to what a safe angle might be -- I presume it would vary depending on the horizontal speed at the time of failure.


    Andy.
     
  6. Brad Meier

    Brad Meier Active Member
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    You should know by now I don't rely on data! Basically, there is no safe angle. I've seen an MK come down at full power and tilted over about 100 degrees. Something like that is going to go a long ways before it hits, probably more like 10 to 1. Know your equipment, know your abilities, and have an out
     
  7. Andy Johnson-Laird

    Andy Johnson-Laird Administrator
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    Yeah. Data is nasty stuff. Tends to really mess up theories. :)

    At 10:1 that's almost as bad as a Cessna 172's glide ratio.... :)
    I don't think I want to be anywhere near crowds.
     
  8. Tyler Olson

    Tyler Olson Member

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    perhaps it would be worthwhile to create a quad / hex covered in foam with prop guards that is a bit more crowd friendly?? :) Something small that only carried a gopro might be reasonably safe.

    On the flip side, I feel the octo I'm flying is a flying guillotine!
     
  9. Shaun Stanton

    Shaun Stanton Active Member

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    This really pi**es me off:mad: It is only a matter of time before one of these people crashes into a crowed. Lets see, I could have a battery malfunction, a lost motor, a flight control board or a sensor on said board fail. A RC lost signal because of radio and electrical interference cause from the stage equipment and the copter goes into fail-safe runs out of battery and crashes. You could loose orientation or sight of the copter in a wooded area such as this. There are at least 5 ways I can come up with to crash this copter without doing anything wrong pilot wise with exception of loss of orientation.

    The only RC aircraft I could see as an exceptable platform over a crowed would possibly be a blimp or an aero-stat.
     
  10. Cedar Beauregard

    Cedar Beauregard New Member

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    I must say I was reluctant to make this post partially because I've been guilty myself and mostly because I didn't and don't want to cause any rifts.. But as a community I think we should start voicing our concern.. Mostly I see "Cool shots" below a Facebook post with crowd surfing videos or an event video.. Until the flights per failure rate is greatly improved its just not worth the risk..

    As the saying goes if we don't police ourselves someone else has to..
     
  11. Tyler Olson

    Tyler Olson Member

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    I think if a customer requests a shot like this it is our job to make them aware of the risks and question the professionalism of anyone who is willing to undertake such a shot.
     
  12. Shaun Stanton

    Shaun Stanton Active Member

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    Edit: I agree the flight should have never happened the customer should be informed that it is a stupid idea to find someone else.

    Ultimate responsibility for safety of flight rests solely with the pilot in command bar none! That is the standard for any flight operations in the world. Plenty of fatal mishaps were the result of bad pilot judgement, trying to meet customer needs, or in military parlance push a mission. Examples in the manned world are pilots making a bad approach and failing to go around because it would cost the company money for the reattempt. A pilot decides to takeoff over gross weight in a private charter, because the customer demanded it and crashes in the ocean on takeoff from Bermuda. I could go on and on. But the fact is, it is the responsibility of the pilot to not fly recklessly even if that means turning down a business opportunity. It is not worth it. Had this flight gone wrong the potential wrath would have been huge. Not only would that pilot have been sued into bankruptcy, but our whole community would have been a 4 letter F word.

    @Cedar you are correct in posting this. This behavior needs to admonished. The only way the FAA is going to take this serious as a useful tool for commercial use, is if people stop treating it like a toy. It is not a toy, it can hurt people when used in a reckless manner. Does that mean we only do shots of orchards and remote fields? No of course not, but reasonable judgement can be used when operating this equipment. There is thing to fly in parks or areas that may have some non-participants in the area because the likely hood of a mishap is not as great. Over a dense crowed, that is where people need to draw the line. Bad decisions, poor judgement and complacency are the father of aviation mishaps. We must develop a professional safety culture, that we will not put unnecessary risks to what we do. Safety of flight is a mindset that must be ingrained early on. The lack of this mindset and the mindset that you can treat the Cinestar or equivalent like a blade MQX or even a DJI Phantom is going to be what gets this banned.

    This is what we are trying to accomplish with PARCAP. We are trying to show the public that we have this mindset. When we go to the FAA we want to be able to say there is group of us who don't do or condone these kinds of negligent behavior. Before these will ever be safe they will need redundancy for systems failure. I like what Freefly is doing with Synapse, by putting in real battery redundancy, but it is not enough. We need a backup independent flight control system that can handle a main flight control system failure to bring the copter back when it fails and other systems that allow for a safe return of the aircraft. We should have a more robust radio system. Currently we have none.

    We need to show that we do not tolerate this.
     
  13. Tyler Olson

    Tyler Olson Member

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    @Shaun - I think we agree, perhaps I just did not explain myself well enough. My point was that one should not take a job like this, inform the customer why (the dangers) and suggest they question the professionalism of anyone who does think it is OK.
     
  14. Shaun Stanton

    Shaun Stanton Active Member

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    Sorry for my tone, I did misread you . The way it sounded is as the customer would make the final call on those risks. Now that I reread it no you did communicate it. I Absolutely agree they need to know that this is a very fragile environment that is not worth the risk to them or us. They need to understand that they are liable as well, for the actions of the flight. In a court of law the lawyers will go after them as well. I turned down a concert event. Once I explained the potential outcome of my aircraft potentially having an anomaly and possibly nosing over 90 degrees or more and speeding a 15+ pound of aircraft at speeds greater than 60 miles per hour with 8 rotating filet knives towards the crowed, the guys eyes became wide as dishes, and said, "yeah we cant have that liability." He thanked me for the honesty to let him know. The thing that worries me are the idiots who are short sighted and will be willing to accept doing this without any forethought in what they are doing.

    You are right the public and a customer needs to be educated in what is safe and not safe.
     
  15. Tim Joy

    Tim Joy Active Member

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    That's a good way to put it. :) And TRUE.

    This is what blimps and cable-cams are good for.
    Maybe every cinestar/multi sold should come with an agreement. "I agree not to fly over crowds and innocent bystanders."

    I always laugh at people that say they've never crashed or had anything go wrong and think that can continue forever.
    There is a similar thread at MRF pledging not to fly these type of jobs.
     
  16. Adam Paugh

    Adam Paugh Distributor

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    A while back I created a "Pre-flight Checklist and Standards" reference guide (see attached). At QC we hand it out to all our RTF customers when they come to our shop for training.
    Please have a look through it and let me know what you think. I tried to keep the Checklist generic enough for most multi-rotors. The flight control info is MK-based. I have wanted to produce some laminated card versions of this guide and stickers for operator's Peli cases. So much time, so little to do...o_O

    Greetings
    Adam
     

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  17. Tom Wadsworth

    Tom Wadsworth New Member

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    I am assuming you have seen this near miss but this is being investigated here in the UK and was a near miss with crowds and went in the Thames instead of someones head.

     
  18. Gary Haynes

    Gary Haynes Administrator
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    Tom, I sent in a request on this incident to the AAIB. This was the response.

    Thank you for your enquiry below. The AAIB has received a copy of an MOR (via the CAA) on this occurrence, however, will not be opening an investigation.

    As the Mandatory Occurrence Reporting (MOR) Scheme is part of the Civil Aviation Authority’s (CAA’s) monitoring function, I would recommend that you contact the CAA concerning any MORs submitted on UAV (UAS) events.

    Have a second request into the CAA for a copy of the MOR. Unfortunately the online system doesn't seem to break out UAV as a selection choice. Or perhaps I am not in the right spot.

    Will post more when I get it.
     
  19. Duane Bradley

    Duane Bradley Active Member

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    I agree with lots that is here! As responsible PIC's it is up to us to tell clients what is considered safe or not safe. If they are pushing for a particular shot, and you say its not safe, if you do still get the job, expect that they will ask on the day for you to do that shot. I've seen it hundreds of times on the shows I've working on doing stunts or with large dangerous animals. You can tell them as clear as day that it is not safe, but they will always push and push when the time comes to get you as close to it as possible. This lead us to start putting in the job contract not just what we had agreed to, but also what we had agreed that can't be done!

    I've also warned a production about something being too dangerous and they said 'Oh..we never thought about that.' They then went to a competitor hired them (not telling them about the dangerous parts) and then when the company got there told them, 'Oh, since you're here, can you do this?' knowing that their answer should be that its too dangerous. They also know since you're there and being paid, the can pressure you to feeling obligated to try.

    If you turn down a job having told production/client no, keep records (emails, etc.) for why. That way when a tool takes that job and screws up, we can show the authorities in question that the responsible pilots are going about this safely. We should also have a thread here that when you turn down a dangerous job, you can warn other people them. That we if they try to pull a fast one on someone else, they can be forewarned about what the client really wants.

    I don't know...thinking as I type here.
     
  20. Katya Nelhams-Wright

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    Hi Tom
    We are in the UK and we spoke to the CAA last week about the X Factor incident. We were concerned that there was an issue with the FC that we all might want to know about. My colleague spoke to them but the indication was that there was an issue with the antennae coming loose and this caused the machine to respond erratically so the pilot decide to put the craft in the water for safety.
     

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