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This references a supreme court decision from 1946. It's hard to imagine that the court was trying to protect this behavior, my guess is that they were addressi

by gnoway 13y ago

This references a supreme court decision from 1946. It's hard to imagine that the court was trying to protect this behavior, my guess is that they were addressing the issue of whether a property owner had rights to control air travel over their property. Likewise, it's almost inconceivable that there are not guidelines covering minimum cruise height or similar. You can't just go buzzing everyone's house with your private ultralight, can you? If not, I expect the same guidelines should apply to your United Twerpists dodecacopter(tm) drone.

asynchronous13 13y ago
You're right that the earlier decision was more related to air travel. The precedent that was set is that a property owner can only claim air space up to a height that is actively used by the property owner. So if you have a windmill, for example, you can claim the airspace to a greater height than your neighbor with only a trampoline. FAA defines minimum heights manned aircraft, usually 1000ft above the tallest obstacle when flying near a city (helicopters are exempt from this rule, though). FAA also defines rules for radio-controlled aircraft. Namely, small r/c aircraft must fly below 400ft and within line-of-sight of the pilot.