Call me a cynic, but I very much doubt mainstream media will ever air this real-world, practical approach. Let's have a "drone" (I HATE that word when applied to model multi rotor craft..) get hit by a real aeroplane at an airfield. Yes, they rightly say that increased mass and increased speeds will make a difference, but still this is educational IMHO. 

Excellent footage of the venerable AN-2. Mind you some may argue that this plane is obviously built like a brick outhouse, and Russian... (I mean that in a good way!). I bet the AN-2 could take a few rounds of 7.62 x 39mm too and still be OK.. 😎

 

What the hell was the point to destroying those toy quad-copters? They sounded and acted drunk...:{

Although it is always interesting to see slow-motion footage, there are no real surprises as to what is going to occur. So I don't think it was a particularly valuable experiment if they were trying to determine the risk of drone/quadcopters coming into contact with aeroplanes.

For a kick off, as much as I like the Antonov An-2, it's hardly a typical aeroplane. Any such experiment or demo should really be going for what at least might be a more likely scenario. The An-2 is powered by a Shvetsov ASh-62 rated at over 1,000 hp, turning a massive four-bladed prop; essentially this is the same engine as the R1820 Wright Cyclone found on the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, so it's hardly the typical aero engine these days. In addition to this, the An-2 is either Dacron or Fabric covered, so the damage to the wing's underside is hardly what one would typically see for most aeroplanes. Most that you come across these days are either stressed alloy or composite in construction.

So it seems to me it would have been better to use something like a Jabiru or a Cessna 152, which are light and small and commonly found at the kinds of altitudes a drone might be at since they are popular training aeroplanes which spend most of their time at circuit height. A more substantial quadcopter drone of the kind which might be flying up high near circuit altitude to get aerial shots would have been a more credible test subject too; something which has some weight to it and therefore poses at least a fairly credible threat. Moreover, unless the impact is occurring at the cruise speed of the aeroplane and drone combined, the damage is not representative of what is potentially possible.

Admittedly drones such as these are a bit pricey, but if you're going to the expense of cranking up an aeroplane and damaging it, clearing an airfield for your use, having a large camera crew, and all that entails, I guess you can afford to destroy a £1,200 drone as well; especially for the purposes of gaining some actually useful data. The DJI Phantom (a favourite for aerial shots at decent quality) weighs about one and a half kilograms, so it's not an inconsiderable amount of weight, and is therefore a far more credible threat to an aeroplane's integrity in a high speed impact.

Nobody in their right mind would expect a cheap and crappy toy-grade knock-off copy plastic drone, of the kind they were using, to pose any kind of significant threat of danger to an aeroplane, in spite of the media's alarmist nonsense about the cheap crappy drones which idiots fly near airports being some kind of massive threat to safety. Sure, some lightweight toys might cause some damage, but the likelihood that a crappy toy drone, rather than a larger more robust one which is far more likely to be up at the kind of altitudes where it poses a threat, is going to cause enough damage to bring down an airliner is miniscule; it's small GA aeroplanes and single-engined jet fighters (if they ingested a large, heavy, professional-grade camera drone) which would be more at risk, so those are the kind of things such a test should be done on in order to gain any kind of actually useful data.

Still kind of cool to see that prop mincing up that drone though 🤣

Edited June 10, 20206 yr by Chock

3 hours ago, Chock said:

it's small GA aeroplanes and single-engined jet fighters (if they ingested a large, heavy, professional-grade camera drone) which would be more at risk, so those are the kind of things such a test should be done on in order to gain any kind of actually useful data.

Don't forget helicopters. They spend plenty of time at lower altitudes and there have been cases where a 3 lb bird went through the windshield. A turbine single engine helicopter probably wouldn't react well to a drone going down the intake either.

While the media may get a little carried away, I don't think brushing drones off as harmless is good either. Too many people still doing dumb things like flying over forest fires to get a pretty shot.

Edited June 10, 20206 yr by goates

Nice! Very interesting. That AN2 is a beast! Sturdier than modern aircrafts. I thought even a light drone would always do significant damage to any aircraft, but evidently that's not the case.

Now an even more interesting video would be, what happens if an AN2 collides with a flying Nokia 3310? 😆

 

I watched that video where a dji quadrotor was shot out of a cannon into the leading edge of a GA wing. Now it punched a hole into the wing structure, yet despite the hole, the shape of the wing did not alter much, the upper and lower wing surface looked to remain mostly aerodynamic. When they shot the bird (gelatin cylinder bird-approximate) into the leading edge it did not penetrate as far into the wing but it pushed the panels up and back, looking like a spoiler or airbrake right on the leading edge which would surely remove quite a lot of aerodynamic performance would it not?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QH0V7kp-xg0

What we'd need is a bored millionaire to arrange a real test somewhere over a desert. Either get someone with a parachute to pilot a 152 or 172 near the end of its life (still airworthy!) and have a quadrotor hit it at altitude (may need several attempts at this!). Better still outfit the 172 with full "radio control" much like the old QF-4 Phantom drones (proper drone!) etc. Airliners have also been fitted with RC to investigate crash scenarios in the past.. the boneyards are filling up with jets so one could even carry out a test with one of those.Heck, there's car parks full of brand new 737s... 😜 A risk matrix would then be able to be generated to see how hard or easy it is to get a quadrotor to actually hit something when you're aiming for it, and the level of catastrophe caused. Note that the quads never actually hit on the leading edge of the AN-2s wing despite the setup - only glancing blows apart from one which hit the strut and severed the thermometer wire.

I guess we all know that a turbofan will not react well to ingesting bits of metal, plastic and silicon (and li-po battery), but still I suspect there's more than enough static turbofan engines in the world with which to carry out an ingestion test for real (Not with my old CF6 which I spool up at the weekends to annoy the neighbours! Joke: I don't have one, but there are several privately owned turbine engines out there of various sizes).

Actually the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have carried out a real world "test" (accident) with one of their helicopters versus on of THEIR OWN "drones" (FLIR Skyranger R60 - a rather heavy 2.4 kg and large quad 60cm across) - no one died...

https://wwwapps.tc.gc.ca/saf-sec-sur/2/cadors-screaq/rd.aspx?cno%3D%26dtef%3D%26dtet%3D2020-06-04%26otp%3D-1%26ftop%3D%3e%3d%26ftno%3D0%26ijop%3D%3e%3d%26ijno%3D0%26olc%3D%26prv%3D-1%26rgn%3D-1%26tsbno%3DA20P0019%26tsbi%3D-1%26arno%3D%26ocatno%3D%26ocatop%3D1%26oevtno%3D%26oevtop%3D1%26evtacoc%3D3%26fltno%3D%26fltr%3D-1%26cars%3D-1%26acat%3D-1%26nar%3D%26aiddl%3D-1%26aidxt%3D%26optdl%3D-1%26optcomt%3D%26optseq%3D%26optxt%3D%26opdlxt%3DResults%2Bwill%2Bappear%2Bin%2Bthis%2Blist%26mkdl%3D-1%26mkxt%3D%26mdldl%3D-1%26mdlxt%3D%26cmkdl%3DC%26cmkxt%3D%26rt%3DQR%26hypl%3Dy%26cnum%3D2020P0775&fbclid=IwAR0e8edDMF1H652LGo8lUFq2yAshSmB3EkBtOZdwN_Uv2aqsQs8ntOAIqYs

Interesting find... like many things of unknown quantity* one can easily overreact to a new threat.

I have long suspected that a drone strike, even say a Phantom 4 - sized one,  might not be as bad as a decent size feathered lump of meat. I am imagining beating each of these with say a golf club. The drone is going to shatter and dissipate its momentum in random directions, whereas the live one will tend to absorb all the shock and stick rather messily to the striking surface.

I think someone needs to do the testing, if only to stop the silliness of having to close a major airport at the first sign of small UFO. 

Disclaimer: I do not own a Phantom, nor do I condone the stupidity of someone thinking of mixing one with active airspace. But it would be good to be able to frame the right response.

I wonder if the RCMP will kindly share more information and photos? Also the heli was at 300 feet AGL, I'm not sure Amazoogle want anyone else or anything interfering with "their" sub 400 feet AGL, including law enforcement... (it's coming, because money..)