This reminds me of a VICE program around Columbian Narco Submarines (1)<p>The show highlights, at one point, a guy who engineered an incredible drug "torpedo" that could be towed behind a fast boat, cut and dropped instantly if trouble arose, and recovered via digital homing beacons safe and sound at a later time.<p>I was struck by how proud he was of it, from a purely technical perspective.<p>And it was a damn smart solution to a problem, albeit one that was unfortunately illegal.<p>(1) <a href="https://www.vice.com/video/colombian-narcosubs" rel="nofollow">https://www.vice.com/video/colombian-narcosubs</a>
Why not just use a fixed-wing RC aircraft?<p>Multi-rotor copters are great for stability and easy to fly, but suck for, say, flying over a border.<p>And depending on your noise requirements, you could even use a fuel powered engine, which would give you much better height, range, speed, and payload.
This has been discussed before and is a favorite of some of the robotics communities. This particular drone seemed to be a bit overloaded (2.7kg?) and I'm guessing the person who launched it hadn't made the connection between flight time and weight. But still it seems a pretty straight forward way to get drugs from point A to point B.<p>That said, 2.7kg of crystal meth might be worth $270,000 [1]. So the cost of the drone is insignificant to the 'value' of the meth it was carrying. Sending 1kg chunks over on $10,000 drones would still net a decent profit. And $10,000 is a pretty nice drone.<p>[1] <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/faqs/" rel="nofollow">http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meth/faqs/</a>
Here in Austria, the Austrian border patrol are actively recruiting RC-rotor pilots (helicopters) to patrol the terrain around the borders with the eastern European countries.. I know of 2 guys who started the RC helicopter hobby and are now doing regular patrol duty with government-sanctioned rotorwings.<p>The drone era is well and truly upon us. I can't wait until it scales up enough to be able to really have an impact on the transportation industry...
Physics / engineering people: Ignoring cost, is it physically possible to create a drone of not <i>too</i> significant size that could, unaided, take a 1kg payload from almost any useful point on the planet to another point (so a maximum range of, say, 10-15,000km) at below typical radar range?
Bruce Sterling talked about delivery drones in his book <i>Heavy Weather</i> (1995), and implied that they were being used for drugs. However, the one he described was ground based - I think it bounced like a kangaroo or pogo stick.
It's fascinating to think about potential counter-defenses... I can imagine this will spur development of new technologies to intercept small personal drones like these. Regular air defense artillery is too dangerous to use in a busy airspace like the San Diego/Tijuana border where this drone was found, and it is designed to work against military drones which are much bigger. New and different technology is needed to intercept and destroy small personal drug-smuggling drones.
Although this was clearly a failure, I imagine there are a lot of these that are successfully getting across. It's not hard to see where obvious mistakes were made.
This looks absolutely insane. It seems as though someone just taped a pile of these crystal bricks to the top of the drone and let it fly. Astonishing.
it's crazier that they fly in powered hang-gliders for drug drops over the border [1] crash [2]<p>[1] <a href="http://www.kpbs.org/news/2011/may/19/flying-marijuana-over-border-low-slow/" rel="nofollow">http://www.kpbs.org/news/2011/may/19/flying-marijuana-over-b...</a><p>[2] <a href="http://kpbs.media.clients.ellingtoncms.com/img/photos/2011/05/18/Ultra-Light_Crash_tx700.jpg?8e0a8887e886a6ff6e13ee030987b3616fc57cd3" rel="nofollow">http://kpbs.media.clients.ellingtoncms.com/img/photos/2011/0...</a>
2.7 KG? doesn't seem like a cartel operation to me.
I think it's more likely that some Texan decided to cross the border and buy some in bulk.
Fast and Furious = Drone Edition?<p>FAA got pushed around pretty good in the Congress hearing yesterday<p><a href="http://www.c-span.org/video/?c4524659/colin-guinn-testifies-congress" rel="nofollow">http://www.c-span.org/video/?c4524659/colin-guinn-testifies-...</a>
I'm confused for being ignorant about some key aspects of this. Any help would be appreciated:<p>- What is the range between the remote control and the receiver on the drone?<p>- How does the person piloting the drone know where it is going? Do they track its GPS signal?<p>- How does the person piloting the drone know what it is landing on (ground, rooftop, trashcan)?<p>- How likely is it that when a drone is found, its pilot can be identified? What methods of investigation, if any?