Flight time and altitudes

sea cooter · Dec 3, 2016

I'm a writer working on a novel that involves use of a drone for surveillance. I need to know what drone model would effectively stay in the air, monitor and video an illegal transaction and what would the greatest distance from control and what is the greatest distance from which it can return to a boat for landing. I need an idea on model, flight time out and back for safe return, and what is the highest altitude it can reach yet acquire and transmit video back to the boat. I need to describe something relatively quiet, too. Thanks.

msinger · Dec 3, 2016

We don't fly this type of drone here. Phantoms are far too noisy to do any kind of undetected surveillance. You'll likely need to speak to someone who works in/with the military.

Alex Baxter · Dec 3, 2016

Interesting..
Drones are noisy, my Phantom 3 can be heard 500 metres away if there's no background noise.

I'd say a Mavic would be reasonable bet, 27 minutes flight time tops, small dimensions, altitude maximum is 500 metres, distance from operator a couple of miles, it'll not be visible or audible at that height, but you'd not see any transactions either. You'd need to be within a hundred metres to get the transactions visually, and then it would be audible and visible. I'd suggest that you modify your hypothetical drone and put a telephoto lens on it, in which case you could use an Inspire.

alokbhargava · Dec 3, 2016

You need not specify the drone model in your novel. Describe a noisy scenario where no one can hear the drone's noise. A height of 200' should be good enough. Many available drones can fly for about 20 minutes easily and go up to say 1 mile. White clouds can hide the white colored flying drone.

Sent from my iPhone using PhantomPilots

Alex Baxter · Dec 3, 2016

It's been said that a stepladder and a good camera would be better for that sort of work...

sea cooter · Dec 3, 2016

Thanks for feedback. The scenario is at sea with drone hovering a few hundred feet over two noisy vessels; one a container ship the other a smaller boat. I'll bet it would not be heard or noticed. Bad guys, acting like fishermen, are a couple of miles away monitoring video from drone which is sent up when radar on their boat indicates the two target boats are actively transferring merchandise. There is no interference of any kind. They use the drone to visually verify that packages are being transferred to the smaller vessel. I like to ID products and equipment for sake of reality. The boat of the bad guys has a specialized foredeck to accommodate take-off and landing of the drone. I'll check out specs on Mavic. I was hoping a P-4 would do the trick -- I'm thinking about buying one!