FAA, Drones and Privacy

One thing that has always bothered me about airplanes is privacy. You can 
be standing out in your backyard or the woods, alone, private, 
contemplating, thinking, with the world all to yourself, focusing and out 
of nowhere 'brrrrrrr' a muffler less airplane flies overhead interrupting 
the peace and quiet along with your train of thought and the privacy you 
had.

Privacy is important. I've never seen the airline/airplance industry 
address the issue unless it's wearing a bikini on a sun deck someplace. 
The aero industry has always had a sort of bravado around it that subdues 
the issue of privacy with guffaws and insinuations of irrelevance. 
However, now, with the introduction of unmanned aerial vehicles it's time 
to bring the people on the ground into the forums and comment periods for 
new regulations.

The FAA is doing a nice job figuring out how to introduce drones into our 
air space. Their number one priority is privacy. Currently they don't 
allow drones for profit, only research (see the recent FAA Fact Sheet date 
June 10, 2010 on Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS)). However if your read 
the documents on the FAA web site there is no mention of privacy outside 
of referral to other agencies.

The public in Pakistan and Afghanistan are in an outrage over the invasion 
of their airspace by drones. Public opinion has taken on revolutionary 
proportions against the U.S.  taking up arms because of the invasion of 
drones into their lives and their air space. It's an important issue and 
we need to ask how the same affect Americans.

We're giving up a huge chunk of our freedom when it comes to drones 
watching what we do. The FAA is putting safety first, but dare I say 
privacy issues have extended into the realm of safety when people are 
concerned over their rights and drone invasion. The FAA's going to need 
more money to move Aeronautics forward and include the rights of the 
public on the ground.

kb
kbushnel.sdf-us.org/contact.html

Notes:
1) http://www.faa.gov/news/fact_sheets/news_story.cfm?newsId=6287