LAPD helicopter tracker with real-time operating costs

As someone who lives in central LA and has them circle my neighborhood frequently, actually shaking my house, I think this is awesome.

These needs should be filled by drones. Way less noisy, dangerous and expensive.

why LA is spending thousands/hour when drones exist is crazy.

Idk, having a bunch of government surveillance drones doesn't really sound great... Maybe we just don't need this level of surveillance at all?

You're talking about technology that's only become realistic in the last couple years. Even then, there's probably nothing off-the-shelf that would serve the current need.

LAPD has been patrolling with helicopters for decades. I have yet to see a drone follow a car in high speed pursuit down the 5 at 100+ MPH.

Couldn’t someone take out the drones pretty easily?

It's absolutely worth looking at the ROI on these flights and weighing that against the intrusion on our privacy/freedom. No doubt they'll always need drones and helicopters but I'd be surprised if there was any real need for them to be in the air that often. I think that's a question that should be asked everywhere but the LAPD in particular are terrible enough that it makes this a great place to start.

Down in SD at least, the sheriff's office helicopters serve many purposes. They'll use them for firefighting, hike rescues (often! according to their IG), first responder to an aviation accident, loudly shouting garbled messages through their loudspeaker, etc.

There's just enough high-speed/timely crime here that I prefer they use these over drones. There's some extra legal protections built into helicopters that drones don't get, like prison time if some idiot points a laser pointer.

The MQ-8 would be cheaper to operate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northrop_Grumman_MQ-8_Fire_Sco...

On the other hand, I have seen drones chase down F1 cars at 100+ MPH...

Realistically though, I agree with your sentiment. Solving this would drones would require a constant flock of something more akin to Predator drones.

The better question is - why do we allow high speed pursuit chases in the first place?

Pretty sure these can't be bought by municipalities. Would make more sense to operate them though.

That depends on the drone. There are drones/UAVs that fly so high in the air you can't even see them seeing you from the ground. Even low flying drones would be very hard to hit from a car involved in a high speed chase, and it's not as if people can't shoot at helicopters which are both larger/easier targets and much more dangerous if brought down.

I seriously doubt that physically rescuing hikers or delivering first-responders to plane crashes represent a large percentage of LAPD helicopter missions. I live in a nice suburb and there's one of them circling over it probably weekly.

I don't see why large drones can't do most of what these helicopters are doing. They're using needlessly expensive helicopters, too.

LAPD doesn't conduct rescue operations or anything like that. Different helicopters are used from different agencies.

Why do we need to follow a car in a high speed pursuit and force it to go 100mph on uncontrolled streets is the better question

As far as I'm aware, high speed drones tend to have quite short flight durations due to battery limitations. Drones that have the range to follow a fleeing suspect for a long time would probably have to be big enough that they could cause a fatal accident if they crash, and in that case I'd rather have a pilot on board. Better reaction time, no risk from jamming, much better field of view/awareness, decades of testing, etc.

> why do we allow high speed pursuit chases in the first place?

AFAIK they've changed their tactics in recent years, but growing up around LA these we're like sporting events on TV. It's a guilty pleasure, but almost everyone I know tuned-in and watched the chase.

I was in Santa Monica - the dense part with all the alleyways - during a foot pursuit involving a heli. Felt like I was in vietnam. It was at night, they were pretty low, and that light felt like the sun coming into the building.

The person “forc[ing] it to go 100mph” is in the car being chased.

Chased by what? It isn't a lion they are running from. It is a police interceptor egging them on to go 100mph.

In what way would that be cheaper to operate? You'd just replace a pilot with a few pilots and a few teams of software engineers. Maybe fuel savings?

Their popularity for viewers (even more so now with YouTube, but they’re long been a staple of live news and late night tv) and the fact that police like any excuse to do “badass” things are big parts of why they still happen. They’re a pretty bad idea. Endangering lives (including bystanders) over mostly relatively-minor crimes.

But people love ‘em, and if you point out what a bad idea they are people label you “soft on crime” (as happens with a lot of plainly good policy)

I think they’re overwhelmingly being chased by a police vehicle after a lawful request to pull over and stop.

The fleeing driver is choosing to turn that lawful stop into felony fleeing/eluding if they choose to attempt to flee at triple digits.

This is very much an “it takes two to tango” situation.

Without both of:

- A driver willing to flee the cops.

- A cop willing to chase at dangerous speeds

The high-speed chase doesn’t happen. Both make it happen.