[HN Gopher] Spanish police seize large drone used to carry drugs...
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Spanish police seize large drone used to carry drugs from Morocco
Author : shsachdev
Score : 166 points
Date : 2021-07-21 10:20 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (english.elpais.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (english.elpais.com)
| ape4 wrote:
| The obvious advantage for the smugglers is that there is no
| person to get busted.
| munk-a wrote:
| The obvious disadvantage is that the drone is programmed with a
| source and destination point which are easily extracted from
| the machine. Cleaver LEOs could probably get to the receiving
| point within the window when the drone is expected and, if not,
| the points are probably pretty close to their base of
| operations.
|
| When interrogating a pilot the pilot can clearly signal
| distress to compatriots and is likely going to take longer to
| actually disclose their intended destination.
| peteretep wrote:
| Am I completely off-base in thinking almost everything about a
| submersible drone is a better idea? No radar signature, much
| bigger haulage, can idle in location for much longer when needed,
| and presumably supports somewhat surreptitious unloading at sea
| if needed?
| Arnt wrote:
| The sea is flat and you can see a long way. Radar can see a
| long way. These people could choose a landing spot in a hilly
| area with few people and many roads, where few people could see
| the drone land and they could unload, drive off and mingle with
| traffic after only a few minutes' driving.
|
| Maybe the drone could even finish charging unattended and take
| off to fly back to Morocco.
| snovv_crash wrote:
| They can do a battery swap while unloading and send it back
| immediately
| Taniwha wrote:
| The mugin package offers a charger option for the gas
| powered main motor
| Jabbles wrote:
| There is not a large industry of hobby submarine drones you can
| leverage - much more technical skill and effort would be
| needed.
| jasonwatkinspdx wrote:
| From a documentary I watched something like this is one of the
| preferred techniques for the Colombian cartels now. It's called
| the torpedo technique.
|
| They design torpedo style units that get towed behind a fishing
| boat or such. At a desired location they detach it, and it just
| loiters below the surface. At some pre-arranged time it pops up
| to the surface and activates a radio beacon, so that a pickup
| ship can snag it.
|
| It's less complicated than building an autonomous AUV, and far
| less likely to be spotted by arial surveillance than a
| narcosub. Lower capacity but still very lucrative I imagine.
| And very nearly risk free.
| bayesian_horse wrote:
| These narco-submersibles have a much higher entry cost,
| apparently. And you'd probably need something a few meters
| long, just to house the motor necessary to fight the currents.
|
| The drone was apparently off the shelves. And the police didn't
| say if they ever actually got it into the air at all.
| squarefoot wrote:
| Narcos already use mini-submarines, although they're manned.
| They have already been seized in Colombia, Spain and elsewhere
| in the past.
|
| https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2019/11/26/inenglish/15747...
|
| https://news.sky.com/story/homemade-narco-sub-captured-by-sp...
|
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/hisutton/2020/08/31/completely-...
|
| https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/dramatic-video-shows-co...
| Y-Bopinator wrote:
| Why make it unmanned when you have an army of soldiers. Put a
| man in there to steer or scuttle the ship if needed.
| RealityVoid wrote:
| Radio communication is made more difficult by being surrounded
| by water.
| rtkwe wrote:
| The main downsides will be that it has much more drag to fight
| against and also if you're actually underwater you can't just
| use GPS like you can in the air making navigation much harder.
| detritus wrote:
| The Straits of Gibraltar has a strong net inflow current, which
| might make drone submersibles a bit prone to getting lost.
|
| Also, the prior art for smuggling across the straits were fast
| launches which would bump upon to beaches and be quickly
| disgorged. This means that the Guardia Civil take a lot of
| interest in what happens along the coast.
|
| Also, let it be said that the coast up East from Gibraltar is
| very much not as empty as it is from Algeciras Westwards, with
| a lot of development on the Costa del Sol. Makes it hard to
| have slower than launches/ribs submarines do their thing.
| jeffreyrogers wrote:
| > The Straits of Gibraltar has a strong net inflow current
|
| Just a fun fact, I heard that during WWII most of the U-boats
| that made it through the Strait of Gibraltar never made it
| out. A combination of being sunk and not having powerful
| enough engines to make it back out.
| galaxyLogic wrote:
| Does that mean the Mediterranean is filling up like a
| bathtub?
| detritus wrote:
| A bathtub that significantly evaporates over its suface,
| yes, sort of.
|
| - ed. Less bubbles.
| eloff wrote:
| I predicted drug smuggling via drones would be a thing when I
| learned about consumer drones 7 years ago now. Sometimes it sucks
| to be right.
| antb1235 wrote:
| When the price drops enough maybe refugees by drone?
| votingprawn wrote:
| Its a mugin if anyone is interested (take the manufacturer specs
| with a handfull of salt)
| https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-5-pro-5000mm-super-la...
| [deleted]
| chrisseaton wrote:
| In British English 'mug[g]ins' is a fool being taken advantage
| of.
| SMAAART wrote:
| only 12k? I want one!
| api_or_ipa wrote:
| $12k for the airframe. Each engine (4x) is another $8k. I
| wouldn't be surprised if the out-the-door cost of the
| airframe, engines, avionics and controls surpasses $50k.
| munk-a wrote:
| Actually, from their website it looks like there is a
| bundle package[1] of the necessary guts that brings the
| full price to about 20k.
|
| 1. https://www.muginuav.com/product/power-package-for-
| mugin-445...
| atourgates wrote:
| I wonder what they're using as a flight controller? Is it
| linked to the ground (via cellular or similar) during the
| whole flight? Or autonomous for part of it?
|
| EDIT: Looks like their ARTF electric version uses the
| Ardupilot CUAV V2+ -
| https://ardupilot.org/copter/docs/common-cuav-v5plus-
| overvie...
|
| I can't find any information on the data link, that they
| call: "Sprintlink Pro Data link & Video Link". So not
| sure if this uses cellular networks, or something else
| during flight. Hybrid products definitely exist:
| https://www.skyhopper.biz/products/communication-data-
| links-...
|
| EDIT 2: The ARTF version is wild. For under $20K - you
| can just buy a drone that can deliver a 3kg package
| (6.6lbs) anywhere within about a 100 mile range.
| https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-ev350-full-
| electric-v...
|
| Besides "last mile shipping" and smuggling implications,
| I'm trying to think of how this could be useful today.
| Maybe some kind of search and rescue where someone
| activates a personal locator beacon, and you could send
| them supplies before you could reach them? A little under
| a gallon of water?
|
| IDK, seems like a stretch. But I feel like there has to
| be more practical implications.
| imtringued wrote:
| I looked up the cost of Warmates and they are also around
| $20k. Considering APKWS has existed for much longer and
| has a higher explosive yield and range and the fact that
| an Apache can carry a whole rocket killer swarm of 38
| APKWS I honestly don't see how "slaughter bots" are
| supposed to be a threat when drones are that expensive.
|
| The myth that drones are cheap should die. Crappy plastic
| toys with flight times measured in minutes are cheap. The
| real deal is just as expensive as everything else.
| nine_k wrote:
| Things become cheap if they are mass-produced.
|
| Most current drones are highly custom, like cars in 1900.
| They can be much cheaper once a "Ford T" of drone tech
| emerges.
| [deleted]
| coolspot wrote:
| That's just empty airframe without any electronics or engine.
| TOMDM wrote:
| Yeah I was surprised by that figure too
|
| Seems it's only the airframe though and maybe the fuel tank.
|
| VTOL motors, alternator, engine, props, control system etc.
| are all extra.
| hengheng wrote:
| So manufacturer says MTOW is 90kg, which likely means they
| barely got it in the air once at freezing temperatures on a
| very long tarmac strip. Max speed of 170 km/h would indicate
| that it's happy cruising at around 120-150 km/h. The place they
| found it in a barn is 170km away from the Morrocan coast around
| El Hoceima, so about two hours of flight including take-off and
| climb. Compared to a specified 7hr max flight time, they'd have
| to fill it up to about one third, so 9 liters of fuel, or 7kg.
|
| An empty weight of 25kg and 7kg of fuel gives us rougly 32kg of
| empty take-off mass, and you then could load it up with not-
| quite 50kg of payload. Significant, but a far cry from the
| 150kg that was reported.
| blutack wrote:
| Unfortunately, the 26.5kg empty weight they specify is the
| bare airframe. That means it excludes the engine, VTOL
| powertrain (motors + escs + props), general
| wiring/electronics and VTOL batteries.
|
| Their quoted "25kg" payload is likely about right for a
| shorter flight.
| yial wrote:
| This is running on gas, not electric. Their suggested
| config includes 27 liters of fuel.
| mwambua wrote:
| Interesting! I was confused by the electric vertical
| motors in the news story's image... but it looks like the
| main engine is fuel powered, and an alternator powers the
| electric motors: https://www.muginuav.com/wp-
| content/uploads/2020/12/Mugin-60...
| hengheng wrote:
| Yeah, likely. I'd still be confident that it can cross the
| mediterranean away from the Strait of Gibraltar. But maybe
| the overpromising is why they found it in a barn in mint
| condition, and not in the air.
| blutack wrote:
| Definitely given enough fuel and decent weather.
| snovv_crash wrote:
| 90kg is in VTOL mode, it doesn't have wheels for a rolling
| takeoff
| [deleted]
| lovemenot wrote:
| It's just _marijuana_ and _hashish_ in the payload. From Morocco,
| that 's Bush and Rocky.
|
| Too bad. Better luck next time.
| llampx wrote:
| The article mentions cocaine, which has a higher street value.
| guerrilla wrote:
| Yeah but not in relation to this seizure.
| gibba999 wrote:
| This is within the price range of a flying car (or to be clear, a
| flying coffin; it's pretty tight in there, and I doubt the
| safety).
|
| I'd like a flying car!
| ceejayoz wrote:
| I'm a little skeptical of the claimed vertical take off
| capacity given the photos.
| snovv_crash wrote:
| I think it's the total capacity that it carried over several
| flights. The journalist mixed the numbers up.
| gibba999 wrote:
| I don't need VToL. I need <30mph short runway take-off and
| landing, which is a lot easier.
| Arnt wrote:
| This drone looks similar and its manufacturer also claims
| VTOL and many hours' flight time: https://carbonix.com.au/
| ben_w wrote:
| Every time someone mentions flying cars, I wonder what they
| have in mind that a helicopter isn't the answer to.
|
| I remember helicopters for sale in Farnborough Air Show,
| probably 30 years ago now, the cheapest there cost about
| PS100k. I assume inflation has quadrupled that, but I don't
| follow that market and the stuff on eBay I am unqualified to
| gauge the quality of.
| gibba999 wrote:
| Running costs. I want to get point A to point B cheaply, in
| terms of both fuel and maintenance. Helicopters won't do
| that.
| neverminder wrote:
| Helicopters never really "took off" so to speak, because
| apparently for every 1 hour of flight they need 4 hours of
| maintenance, amongst other issues.
| ben_w wrote:
| Hmm. I am not even slightly a mechanic, but people do seem
| to say electric cars need less maintenance than ICE cars.
| Would electric helicopters (and not just quadcopters) "take
| off"? I do see a lot of news-or-press-releases about
| passenger drones, but I can't tell how realistic any of
| them are.
| neverminder wrote:
| Electric helicopters would be facing the same problem as
| electric planes - energy density. Right now fossil fuel
| energy density is still some 40 times greater than
| batteries and I don't think conventional batteries will
| ever come even close to matching it. There would have to
| be some radically new type of a battery, if such a thing
| is even possible.
| ben_w wrote:
| That becomes relevant precisely when the the battery mass
| is a significant fraction of total mass; for long
| distance flights, this would clearly be the case because
| even hydrocarbons are barely sufficient density on the
| longest flights; for point-to-point within a single city,
| which is how I expect Average Jo to use one if they were
| safe & available at affordable rates, I expect it isn't
| an issue.
| outworlder wrote:
| Less maintenance for the engines and a few other systems.
| Just as much maintenance for other components. For
| instance, the rotor blades have to be replaced every X
| hours and can cost as much as a car, each.
| _wolfie_ wrote:
| I've never understood why flying cars should have lower
| needs for maintainence.
| Retric wrote:
| Mass production allows for more optimization than small
| production runs. Modern cars can go a long time with
| minimal maintenance, but it took a lot of R&D to reach
| that point.
|
| The most successful small aircraft the Cessna 172 Skyhawk
| has averaged than 1,000 produced per year and runs
| ~400,000$ new. They could easily drop that to under 100k
| with modest levels of automation, but can't justify
| automation with current levels of demand. Similarly only
| minimal levels of R&D is worth is at when the market is
| tiny.
|
| It's even worse in the Helicopter market. Presumably
| someone designing a flying car is going to take the R&D
| and automation risks assuming they will pay for
| themselves.
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| It's not even just the automation. There's so little
| demand that GA is really stuck in ancient standards.
|
| I flew 172s for a while and I was really surprised how
| old most of the tech was. Built with rivets, engines
| still using leaded (or lead replacement) gas, still using
| manual mixture like an old car with a choke. Even the
| wired microphone in a modern (manufactured in the 2010s)
| C172 still has this ancient feel about it (not to mention
| that you couldn't use it anyway as the prop noise is way
| too loud to use a radio without headphones).
|
| The instrumentation side definitely has caught up (like
| the Garmin G1000 glass cockpit) but the whole airframe +
| engine combo seems to come straight out of the 1950s. I
| imagine this adds to the cost as a lot of this tech is no
| longer mainstream so there's no economy of scale. You can
| see this in part costs too, and in the price and
| availability of AVGAS (some airports here really don't
| want to carry it anymore and if they do it's really
| expensive).
|
| I've heard of C172s been retrofitted with modern
| turbodiesels with full FADEC but I really don't get why
| they don't come like this out of the factory these days.
| I did see that some of the lighting tech was upgraded
| though: The later ones did have LED beacons. But most of
| the tech was very old.
| bluedino wrote:
| I'd hate to see the amount of paperwork the FAA would
| require if you automated a Cessna production line.
| jsight wrote:
| With enough demand to produce 100k units per year, that
| would amortize well too.
|
| But light aircraft are a hard thing to sell for really
| practical reasons. They have a lot of real world
| limitations for small overall improvements in performance
| vs ground travel.
|
| This might be different for some air taxi services within
| metropolitan areas.
| jeffreyrogers wrote:
| They used to be a lot cheaper. Regulatory changes made
| them much more expensive and reduced demand.
| jeffreyrogers wrote:
| GA aircraft used to be way cheaper than they are now.
| Regulatory changes in the 80s (I think) shifted liability
| to the manufacturer in the event of an accident and
| everything got more expensive. It's not really fair to
| compare an uncertified UAV to a certified GA aircraft,
| because the electric aircraft is going to get a lot more
| expensive once you certify it for passengers.
| Retric wrote:
| I briefly worked with the FAA on their certification
| system and it's surprisingly optimized for mass
| production. Which should be obvious as many aircraft
| components are needed in massive quantities even if the
| total number of commercial aircraft are quite limited.
| Aka the number of turbine blades is larger than the
| number of engines which is larger than the number of
| aircraft.
|
| Unfortunately, this hits GA harder as they have vastly
| fewer components to worry about and small production runs
| are discouraged. That said, assuming flying cars are
| going to come from or limited to the US seems unlikely so
| the EASA also has a significant role.
| jeffreyrogers wrote:
| Most helicopters use jet engines. I think that is where a
| large part of the maintenance cost comes in. The rotor
| assembly is fairly complicated mechanically, but I don't
| know how often it needs to be serviced.
|
| I think the pro-electric people are underestimating the
| maintenance requirements though, especially since
| anything flying has very conservative requirements put on
| it, so just saying "these electric motors will run fine
| for 10,000 hours" or something like that isn't going to
| cut it.
| baybal2 wrote:
| > Most helicopters use jet engines. I think that is where
| a large part of the maintenance cost comes in.
|
| No, gas turbines are much more reliable, and cheaper to
| service than reciprocating engines.
| dividedbyzero wrote:
| My understanding is that a "flying car" is pretty much
| just a lower-maintenance, easier-to-use, safer and less
| noisy helicopter. Any helicopter that doesn't have these
| properties wouldn't work as a flying car, but once (if)
| someone figures out how to do it, I guess it'll become a
| feature of other helicopter designs as well.
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| I spend about 1/3rd of the year each year in Spain and an
| "interesting" development related to drug trades is happening
| here: basically lots of people realized cannabis plants were
| flowering as well, if not better, in Spain than in Morocco.
|
| The EU / Spanish polices also got apparently much better at
| intercepting cannabis dealers trying to pass from Morocco to
| Spain (hence maybe these new drones attempts).
|
| So now there are both individuals and gangs (including gagns from
| Morocco and from eastern europe) growing a huge lot of weed in
| Spain. As in: it's becoming very big business.
|
| Individuals have the right, legally, to grow up to two cannabis
| plants (I think two plants for one adult in the household is the
| rule and you can legally by flowering and auto-flowering cannabis
| seeds in shops). But quite some individuals are, illegally,
| growing much more than two plants as a way to meet months' ends.
|
| Technically this delivery drone is impressive but dealers from
| Morocco have much bigger problems than trying to stuff ganja into
| drones without getting intercepted: growing cannabis plant and
| making hashish and ganja directly in Spain, at cheaper prices.
| the-dude wrote:
| The Moroccan hash is not intended for Spain, but for the whole
| of the EU ( NL in particular ).
| sharken wrote:
| The EU and perhaps NL in particular should really take
| another look at legalizing at least hash.
|
| It would help to also legalize cocaine, but even Colombia
| that would benefit most from it, is still not ready to do
| something to break the status quo.
|
| https://transformdrugs.org/blog/historic-win-for-coca-
| cocain...
| dzhiurgis wrote:
| I'm all in for cocaine legalisation, but how do you make it
| safe? So much heart problems and overdoses that it's
| obviously would cause so much unnecessary deaths.
| colonwqbang wrote:
| People die from cocaine even now when it's illegal. The
| question is if harm would increase due to legalisation. I
| think there is a good argument that harm could actually
| be reduced since quality and dose control would be much
| better. Treatment is also easier when those with
| substance use disorder are not seen as criminals.
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| Many Colombian people would agree to do this, many will
| look at you in bewilderment. The main issue is that too
| many people in government institutions are profiting from
| the status quo. Colombia itself has a rather massive drug
| use problem, or, the people of the younger generation are
| pretty open minded about consumption.
| sharken wrote:
| Yes the corruption makes it difficult to do much, but the
| War on Drugs has been going on for more than 50 years.
|
| It's quite obvious that another 50 years will not do any
| difference, but the proposed bill just might.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_drugs
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| Like most wars it makes the powers that be very rich I
| guess
| hsousa wrote:
| That's exactly why they want to keep the status-quo.
| TacticalCoder wrote:
| Yes of course... but it still (used to?) mostly transit
| through Spain, where it then is passed into France etc. Heavy
| drugs coming from south america do also transit through
| Spain.
|
| I found back the article (in english) I read earlier this
| year on the subject:
|
| https://english.elpais.com/spanish_news/2021-02-03/spain-
| and...
| narag wrote:
| _Individuals have the right, legally, to grow up to two
| cannabis plants..._
|
| I believe that's a misconception. There were a few loopholes,
| fixed by a recent law (three or four year ago IIRC) that nuked
| cannabis clubs.
|
| I'd say it's mostly safe to grow one of those auto-flowering
| seeds in your balcony, providing you use some translucid
| plastic, but telling the police "I have the right to grow two
| plants" seems like a weak defense.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Sounds like they need to form a co-op. Each member signs their
| 2 plants to the co-op to manage/grow/etc. Pay the members
| something for their "license use". I'm guessing there are
| plenty of people that would never attempt to grow those 2
| plants on their own, so don't let it get wasted.
|
| Also, limit the co-op to be run by citizens of that
| country/city to keep it from becoming international rings
| (bwahahahaha, as if that would work)
| derrasterpunkt wrote:
| I think you just described the ,,Cannabis Social Clubs" in
| Spain.
| bayesian_horse wrote:
| The article says they are smuggling cocain. I doubt cannabis
| would be profitable enough.
|
| It's not just about the cost of the drone, it must be a serious
| undertaking for a gang to get a hand on one of those without
| anyone noticing. The thing is basically an ultra-light
| aircraft, and probably extremely illegal to operate anywhere in
| Europe or any sane jurisdiction...
| zenexer wrote:
| Initially it says that the intended purpose was cocaine, but
| then it goes on to say that online marijuana and hashish were
| found.
| bayesian_horse wrote:
| It also doesn't say whether or not they actually had the
| drone in the air at all.
|
| Maybe those guys just hatched a crazy-ass idea, financed it
| with their previous marijuana "business" but haven't so far
| gotten around to actually buying cocaine in Morocco, much
| less smuggling it with a drone...
| dylan604 wrote:
| Maybe it's a false flag op. The smugglers left a little
| something for the local agencies to find so they can do a
| nice bit of PR so the public feels good about it.
| Meanwhile, the smugglers continue using their normal
| trade routes.
|
| This will also help spur more anti-drone legislation
| ruining for the rest of us that never intended to use
| drones in this manner.
| shoto_io wrote:
| Those drug dealers are pain in the ass. First they sell
| drugs to our children, and then go on to ruin our drone
| legislation. What the hell comes next?!
| dylan604 wrote:
| They'll ruin your submarine legislation if you're not
| careful
| hsousa wrote:
| Bruce Simpson is an activist that consistently exposes
| New Zealand's government propaganda.
| https://youtu.be/UNUtYucJchk
| lovemenot wrote:
| >> In total, 30 kilograms of marijuana and 55 of hashish were
| found during the operations in Spain and France.
|
| Yeah. A bit ambiguous. I guess the mention of cocaine was to
| improve the profile of the bust.
| yboris wrote:
| Portugal has all drugs decriminalized. I guess smuggling drugs
| _into_ Portugal is still illegal (and the distance is farther).
|
| Can't wait till we end the stupid "war on drugs".
| hsousa wrote:
| That's the only advantage of this small and little country. In
| Portugal it is illegal to own a cannabis plant.
| pixxel wrote:
| Can carry up to 150 kilos. Article doesn't mention street value.
| I've no idea. If it's cocaine, is that millions of dollars? This
| is Morocco though, so more likely hashish, which would be worth
| considerably less. How much though? Just trying to visualise cost
| of drone vs reward ratio.
| mardifoufs wrote:
| I think cartels started shipping cocaine to Morocco, and from
| there they smuggle it to Europe. It's much easier than to send
| it directly to the EU considering how porous the Gibraltar
| straight/maritime routes across the Mediterranean are and that
| there are tons of very well established routes and networks
| already used to smuggling tens of tons of hashish/weed.
| blutack wrote:
| As per votingprawn, it's 25kg at the absolute most (from the
| manufacturers website). If you're flying any distance, a lot
| less than that.
| d1sxeyes wrote:
| Article does mention however that "it was being used for
| packages of narcotics, particularly cocaine".
|
| https://www.statista.com/chart/18527/cocaine-retail-steet-pr...
| shows 67 USD per gram, which means that if you've got 150kg of
| cocaine on board, the street value is just over ten million
| USD.
|
| I don't know how much of that would be profit, but seems quite
| likely there's an excellent cost vs reward ratio - potentially
| even so high that these drones could be used almost disposably
| if they are intercepted less frequently than boats.
| BaRRaKID wrote:
| Street value would be around 10EUR per gram, so 1.500.000EUR
| FDSGSG wrote:
| Sold in units of 1 gram, bigger amounts will be considerably
| cheaper. By the kilo it isn't worth much more than 2-3 euros
| per gram.
| outworlder wrote:
| > The drone can reach altitudes of 2,000 meters (around 7,000
| feet), but in general would fly much lower in order to save fuel
| and avoid detection.
|
| Fly _lower_ to save fuel? How does that make sense?
| avhon1 wrote:
| Probably mostly by not expending energy to climb and then
| descend.
|
| Helicopter lift efficiency varies heavily with altitude, but
| how it varies depends on the weight of the helicopter. Heavy
| helicopters require quadratically more torque to hover at
| higher altitudes, but lightly-loaded helicopters can actually
| require less torque to hover at higher altitudes. Here's a
| (complicated but really cool) diagram to calculate on page 7,
| figure 7-6.
| https://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/a...
|
| Since electric motor current draw is approximately linearly
| proportional to their torque, heavy-lift electric
| helicopters/drones would almost certainly conserve energy by
| flying lower. I'm not sure how that applies to this drone,
| which probably weighs below the lowest line on that diagram,
| and also has more, smaller, higher-speed rotors.
|
| This vehicle probably spend most time traveling as a fixed-wing
| aircraft, and for those, efficiency almost always increases
| with altitude. (Except that their combustion-powered engines
| may require compressors to continue operating at higher
| altitudes. This aircraft's ICE may actually suffer from this,
| if it is an inexpensive engine not designed for aircraft.) So
| if the statement is correct, it's probably referring to the
| energy saved by not having to climb in the first place.
| tincholio wrote:
| The distance that needs covering to fly from northern Morocco
| to Spain is just a few km... probably would be a waste of
| energy to get it to 2km altitude
| outworlder wrote:
| Now that makes sense.
| JumpCrisscross wrote:
| > _Fly lower to save fuel? How does that make sense?_
|
| Propellers like lower speeds and altitudes; fans like higher
| speeds and altitudes [1]. This is because propellers hit the
| air at the true air speed. Compressors in a turbofan modify the
| incident pressure and air speed, letting the engine purr away
| without concern for creating shock waves.
|
| This is a propeller craft.
|
| [1]
| https://www.faa.gov/regulations_policies/handbooks_manuals/a...
| outworlder wrote:
| From your link:
|
| > Turboprop engines are most efficient at speeds between 250
| and 400 mph and altitudes between 18,000 and 30,000 feet
|
| Ignoring the detail that your source is talking about
| turboprop (so, turbine engine with a big fan attached) and
| not a small piston engine, that's still not low altitude.
| That's class A airspace!
|
| Even in a piston aircraft, you have to adjust your mixture as
| you climb, right? You have to add _less_ fuel per unit of
| air. And there's still all the drag from the aircraft itself,
| it's not just about propellers.
|
| Sure, I doubt this drone would have a turbocharger, so
| performance (or rather, horsepower) is expected to drop above
| 10000ft. But not efficiency.
| jjk166 wrote:
| Reducing the fuel/air mixture doesn't increase efficiency,
| yes you need less fuel per unit of air, but you need more
| units of air too.
|
| The problem is the air gets thinner as you go higher,
| meaning you need to fly at higher speeds, which means you
| need to fight more drag. Really it's not flying at low
| altitude to save fuel, it's flying slow to save fuel.
|
| Jet engines become more efficient at higher speeds which
| compensates for the increased drag, and thus jet aircraft
| fuel efficiency goes up at higher altitudes. Piston engines
| are unaffected by airspeed, so at higher speeds they are
| doing more work at the same engine efficiency. Thus the
| aircraft fuel efficiency goes down.
| ohgodplsno wrote:
| Lifting 150kg 2km high is a lot of energy used up. Especially
| when you only need to cover what, a dozen kilometers
| horizontally?
| tibbon wrote:
| Air being denser _perhaps_ means it doesn't have to hit top RPM
| for maintain altitude?
| avhon1 wrote:
| It wouldn't need to spin as fast, but more torque would be
| required to reach any given RPM.
| anfractuosity wrote:
| "The drug gang was flying the drone using an electronic system
| that relayed the exact takeoff and landing points, and used
| waypoints - i.e. places during the flight where it had to change
| course. It could also be flown using remote control." - Does that
| mean it was likely using GPS to follow a particular route?
| blutack wrote:
| Yes, it'll have a Pixhawk or similar in it running ArduPilot
| (or maybe PX4). Both open source (and ArduPilot is maintained
| by Tridge of Samba fame).
| anfractuosity wrote:
| I just found one of the products mugin sells is this -
| https://www.muginuav.com/product/cuav-new-x7-pro-flight-
| cont... which mentions it can run ArduPilot firmware.
| blutack wrote:
| Yep, Mugin are reselling the majority of the stuff in their
| electronics category - they mostly make airframes AFAIK.
|
| A Pixhawk Cube or similar is around the PS250 mark.
| Arnt wrote:
| Just guessing: A waypoint in a fairly lonely part of the
| Spanish coast, then a few points so the drone won't fly over
| cities on its way inland, finally a lonely spot to land.
| blantonl wrote:
| The next interesting step for drug dealers will be last mile of
| delivery of product to customers.
|
| Imagine coupling a Web app with a swarm of drones that can drop
| product on your back porch in a matter of minutes.
|
| You can bet it's coming for illegal products.
| dghlsakjg wrote:
| The grey market (unlicensed) weed guys in Vancouver just use
| cars and ring the doorbell when they arrive.
|
| In the summer, some of them have bikes...
| tomcooks wrote:
| Paralelni Polis released last year an interesting video of a
| drone based last mile transport system for their hydroponic
| lettuce, paid in cryptos
|
| https://youtu.be/_vEJwD5lDTk
| imtringued wrote:
| The police then gets a nice profitable side business involving
| the confiscation of $20k drones.
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| I suppose it would have to take off for Pizza delivery before
| they become inconspicuous enough to make illegal deliveries.
| Like my sibling comments say, a delivery driver or bike courier
| is a lot stealthier than a drone for now.
| azalemeth wrote:
| I wonder what the radar cross section on this thing is? It's
| going to be at least comparable to that of a small light aircraft
| - which are _easily_ detected by primary radar. I think flying
| this across the med with no flight plan, no transponder, and no
| legitimate paperwork would be a very good opportunity to get it
| filmed extensively in-air for free by a friendly European
| airforce. Quite possibly including an explosive and quick
| landing, too!
| radicaldreamer wrote:
| Wonder when we'll start seeing private smuggling drones made
| with radar reducing geometries.
| ErikVandeWater wrote:
| I imagine cartels have no problem flying lower than the legal
| minimum altitude (difficult to track because of ground
| clutter).
| eloff wrote:
| The article mentions it does show up on radar. But it also
| depends on the altitude it's flying at.
|
| The friendly European airforce must have been sleeping because
| the article never mentions any attempted investigations or
| interceptions by the same. I imagine just like the US in 9-11,
| they'd be caught with their pants down if terrorists actually
| tried to use a fleet of these things.
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| It may never have flown of course.
|
| But here in Europe they usually have only secondary radar
| active afaik.
| Luc wrote:
| The picture is rather deceptive, making the drone look huge
| compared to the men standing behind it. When you play the video
| you'll see it's not that big.
| bayesian_horse wrote:
| That drone is basically an ultra-light aircraft, able to carry
| the weight of one or two (slim) adult humans.
|
| Vertical takeoff and landing may be overkill for that use case.
| They could probably get away with Ardupilot and just crash the
| drone...
|
| Fortunately, most people who are able to build such a drone (I
| think many drone-hobbyists could) are smart enough not to go into
| drug smuggling.
| bayesian_horse wrote:
| Well, ok, some people are casting doubts on the 150kg
| payload...
| consumer451 wrote:
| That is a pretty advanced design. It's hybrid gas/electric and
| the manufacturing looks excellent as well. I was expecting
| something patched together along the lines of the semi-
| submersibles that we have previously been shown.
|
| On another note, I really don't see that thing carrying 150kg
| (330lbs) of useful payload. That would be an aerodynamic marvel
| for forward flight, and there is just no way those 4 electric
| motors can support vertical flight with a 150kg payload.
|
| I am just an r/c hobbyist and would love to know if I am off on
| the payload somehow.
| blutack wrote:
| It's a Mugin - https://www.muginuav.com/product/mugin-6000mm-
| extra-large-hu...
|
| Payload is "25kg" and that's probably optimistic.
| GordonS wrote:
| Even if it could "only" safely carry 20kg, that's still
| around EUR100,000-EUR150,000 at the street. I could see how
| this method could be very profitable.
| barcoder wrote:
| This is a really good example of technology being used by
| criminals to circumvent law enforcement while putting the public
| at risk. While I personally think drug laws need to be updated,
| the more interesting discussion here is about creating
| technologies that can cause serious harm to the public and making
| them cheap and easy enough to be used by anyone with a small
| amount of financial backing and a strong insentive.
| 27e733836x wrote:
| Is that really the interesting discussion here? It seems like
| the same ground journalists tread all the time when they want
| to waste a bunch of time opining on nothing. What's the
| alternative? Waste money on purpose? Make shittier user
| interfaces?
| sharken wrote:
| The interesting discussion to me is why governments are not
| doing more to decriminalize or legalize drugs.
|
| That seems to be the only way out of this mess.
| hsousa wrote:
| Have you ever watched Air America?
| grouphugs wrote:
| i dream about being able to take back everything police steal
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