Drone almost hits Skylife Helicopter in Fresno

[JOHN CUERVO]

I am on the cusp of 5 miles from a small airport. (5.2mi as the bird flies) I was flying at 400' (or slightly less) near my home and watched a small prop plane come by really low. Hard to tell from my perspective, but it appeared to be lower than my solo. It wasn't on a terminal path, but I descended anyway. That same prop plane flew 3 low altitude circles around my neighborhood after the initial fly-by. At that point I was keeping the drone closer to 60' in altitude to be safe. I wondered if he/she saw it on the initial fly-by and was trying to locate the pilot. How responsible are we if we're operating within FAA guidelines and the airplane pilot is flying lower than expected?

Thank you for this post, something similar happen to me during the weekend and i even show my usair force nephew and he agreed that such plane was flying way too low violating FAA regulations since the closest airport was more than 7 miles away from our house backyard

 

[Maddog]

Of course, but it's still going to be very difficult to get one exactly into the intake.

They just need to be visually a bit more aware at lower altitude because technically they're more likely to fly into the drone than a drone fly into them if that makes any sense.

Have you ever flown a jet airliner? The visibility from the cockpit is terrible. Especially looking towards the ground. The speeds and high workload while landing or taking off make it difficult to see another plane, let alone a drone. Also, a passenger jet flying with a an FAA clearance will always have the legal right-of-way over a drone.