question on laws of flying / crash recovery etc

[jschick]

ok I fly at my home and am a AMA member. I live in the country with 6 acres and have access to over 300acres of field/woods with my landing strip on my property. I have permission to fly on the field and woods to my left and rear, and have a neighbor 500 feet to my right and from my landing strip acctually he is 500 to the rt and probably another 200+ in front of the strip. Now he is a irrate neighbor which does not get along with anyone, he has troubled kids who launch fireworks at my home and barn, and causes problems with all the other neighbors over nothing. he calles the cops for anything(he is a city guy) but thinks he and his kids can do whatever they want. I do my best to never go near his property or even close to the edge of my property, but once you are over 500 feet in the air I may go over his back corner (hard to tell) i fly my foam wing (electric combat wing XE2) never fly combat just for fun. now Yesterday he walked out to the edge of his property and waited for me to cross the line ( I did once in 6 flights at probably 500 feet high I was gliding and may have crossed his far back corner ) he immidiatly ran up and went irrate and threattened to take it from or if it ever crashed in his field he would bust it up and burn it etc. Now I am well awaire that according to AMA I cannot fly in any field without permission, but how does it go if I have permission to fly on my propperty and all surounding areas except one spot, which I do 95% or better stay away from my other neighbors have asked my to fly overtheir places since they like to watch, I can't though because of this guy. I thought I had seen a law regarding recovery of a aircraft on other property??? and also many years back I thought their may have been a law regarding keeping and returning a aircraft to it's owner?
what would be your thoughts? I also fly me Helicopter but since it stays much closer to the ground it is never a issue it stays well within my property only.
I guess I should also mention that My buddy who is a local cop also flys at my home, he can't believe this guy and all the trouble he causes with others, he has also been warned by the local police to stop his nonsense. so he has stopped calling the police and now he just yells.

thanks for your thoughts
Jon

[ctdahle]

I'd just be darn careful not to crash on his property. If you do, consider the plane a loss and be prepared to make good on any damages to his property. Make sure that you are not flying noisy, un-muffled, large scale planes in the wee small hours. Otherwise, I'd ignore him.

I'm sorry you have such a jerk for a neighbor. I have one too. I'm sitting here at the computer waiting for the cops because my neighbor has left her dog out in the cold (-8 right now) without food or water again for the third night in a row.

The poor animal has been barking since 11:00 PM, and keeps waking the baby.

[jschick]

yea, I try to stay away from him, sad part is we were at one point very good friends but he always talked about how is old neighbors from his past home were such jerks, always causing problems. we have since learned he has had many problems with their police and, now our local police are real tired of him, in fact I saw our police cheif a while back and he actually asked me if he has caused any problems in the neighbor hood.... as far as the flying goes I do stay away from his property, but occasionally it may come close. anyway the local police is preparing a letter describing the laws on personal property theft. he can not keep my plane even if I crash on his property, If i cause damage, I do have to make good on it, but he must return my plane undamaged or he can spend up to 3 Mo in jail. They recomend since he tries to intimidate all the other neighbors, to just send him a letter or just keep it on hand if a accident ever does happen. I will probably just keep the letter on hand.

Jon

[easytiger]

Correct. The law of the land is very clear, he may not keep the airplane. You are responsible for any damage the airplane causes, of course.
Firstup...STAY AWAY FROM HIS PROPERTY. Do not overfly it AT ALL. Not even occasionally, by accident. Re-orient your runway if need be.
Don't count on your local police...it's not really up to them. If he goes to court and gets some sort of order against you, the cops will HAVE to do whatever the order says. And the judge might hate model airplanes, too. You never know.
Sounds like trouble waiting to happen. I would think right NOW about how you are going to AVOID this confrontation. You just cannot predict how something like this will turn out precisely, but as a rule...homeowner with complaint versus modellers...modellers usually lose. No more flying. Stay away from the guy, don't say anything, don't provoke him, and above all, don't THINK about him so much. Just don't overfly his property. Guys like this can really make you mad...it can eat you up and really spoil the hobby. Just shrug, stay off his land, and have fun flying. The less you think about it, the better off you are. Hopefully, he will get bored.

I have one really lousy neighbor, too, right down the hall. I just had to learn to ignore him. It worked. He got bored.

Ouch, about the poor doggie.

[stone_axe]

You are in a tough situation with your neighbor.

You are allowed to fly your plane on your property and any public property unless a local statute specifically prohibits it. You are also allowed to overfly other's private property, land deeds never cover the space above a property and often do not cover the space below a property (mineral rights). Most states, especially western states, do not allow rural land owners to restrict access to land that is not part of a full-time domicile or borders on other large public lands, aka 'freedom to roam' and 'public easement'.

However, there are several blanket laws that your neighbor could exploit to prevent you from flying RC craft. If you fly with gas engines, you are undoubtedly familiar with noise ordinances already. The other blanket law is 'wanton endangerment' which basically means you are knowingly doing something that is likely to hurt someone. Obviously, such a vague law could be used as a 'blank check' to stop you from flying your RC craft.

None of these things, though, will mend your relationship with your neighbor. Using legal avenues and solutions to handle personal problems always hampers relationships between the people involved. Maybe you could review the first episodes of 'Northern Exposure' or 'Green Acres' to help deal with this new neighbor from the city.


David

[leccyflyer]

You need to put his property behind you with sufficient offset to make sure that you don't overlfy his property. You should set up a safety line in front of you (the sort of thing that the AMA recommend) and don't fly behind that. If you consider anything behind that line as a no-fly zone then you reduce the risk of overflying his property.

That means that standing in the middle of your property and flying around yourself is likely to cause problems, as is standing close to your own house and relying on judgement of the position of your model to make sure that you don't overfly his property. Whatever the legality of who owns the airspace, overlfying your neighbour's property under these circumstances is provocative and likely to escalate the situation further, plus expose both you and him to risk should you have a flying accident.

Rest assured you cannot possibly judge distance in the air sufficiently well to ensure that you aren't overflying just by virtue of an estimated distance to his property- you need that angular separation that the safety line and no-fly zone method gives you.

Good luck, sounds like you'll need it.

Brian

[jschick]

thanks for all your comments, I have been ignoring hime for the last 3 years, which is not helping, the neighbors feel he is on a power trip and thinks he is able to intimidate all of us. Ex. the neighbor on the other side had to build a fence 800 feet long down her property, I have planted pine trees along mine and put up fence posts (on my side of the line) because he will wonder on my property all the time (he even clamed 30 feet as his yard since i was not using it but if I get within 20 feet of the line he runs out and will use every name in the book to try to start a argument... like If I am mowing, or watering my trees weeding etc, he will always be their if nothing els stand over me with his arms folded and a nasty look on his face. really a screwed up guy. and to think 5 years ago i helped him build his house, and gave him about 20 trees from my woods to transplant, it wasn't till after he had his landscaping done that he became a idiot!!!!!!! like I said i ignore him or just wave and say hello and go about my buisness, i just feel it is time to try something else.......... but the airplanes is really a very small part of the problem, and I do have a very big tree as a landmark so it is pretty easy to stay clear of his "airspace" I guess I am partly lucky that the police chief has warned him about his attitude with the other neighbors and they are supprized I have not filed any complaints, but that just isn't me, I have lived here for 27 years and this has always been good country living where neighbors help each others out...

JOn

[daron]

if all alse fails shoot him and hide the body sounds like your out in the sticks

[jschick]

Daron,
Funny, but that idea has been given before. We have a real wolf and coyote problem here, thougth about just staking him out some night. give him a small stick for defense and lots of chickens......

[easytiger]

Originally posted by jschick
thanks for all your comments, I have been ignoring hime for the last 3 years, which is not helping, the neighbors feel he is on a power trip and thinks he is able to intimidate all of us. Ex. the neighbor on the other side had to build a fence 800 feet long down her property, I have planted pine trees along mine and put up fence posts (on my side of the line) because he will wonder on my property all the time (he even clamed 30 feet as his yard since i was not using it but if I get within 20 feet of the line he runs out and will use every name in the book to try to start a argument... like If I am mowing, or watering my trees weeding etc, he will always be their if nothing els stand over me with his arms folded and a nasty look on his face. really a screwed up guy. and to think 5 years ago i helped him build his house, and gave him about 20 trees from my woods to transplant, it wasn't till after he had his landscaping done that he became a idiot!!!!!!! like I said i ignore him or just wave and say hello and go about my buisness, i just feel it is time to try something else.......... but the airplanes is really a very small part of the problem, and I do have a very big tree as a landmark so it is pretty easy to stay clear of his "airspace" I guess I am partly lucky that the police chief has warned him about his attitude with the other neighbors and they are supprized I have not filed any complaints, but that just isn't me, I have lived here for 27 years and this has always been good country living where neighbors help each others out...

JOn

Ouch. Yeah, he sounds like a jerk. Problem is, he has you over a barrel on the model airplane thing...he could make it so you could not fly at all. Beleive me, jerk or not, one homeowner can shut you down...in the end, most courts will not see you as having a "right" to fly model airplanes, but they will see HIS "right" to have quiet in his backyard. Nor is a court really interested in hearing all the "backstory elements", all the stuff that happened between you and him beforehand. That would be a seperate case, the court will only want to hear about the model airplanes and the noise. Nor could you even count on the police cheif coming to testify on your behalf. Or a judge giving any merit to that testimony.

Sooooooooo...he DOES have you over a barrel. I know, it's not "fair", but that's how it is.

If you do something to set him off, he has this lever to use on you. So, just RUN AWAY when you see him. There are eighteen million valid reasons why you could have a spat with this guy, from the thirty feet of your property to his dog wandering onto your property, whatever...but he has some leverage here. Don't give him an excuse to use it.

Like Dr. Melfi told Tony Soprano:

"What's wrong with letting them THINK they won?"

Let him have his ego and pride and whatever, let him think he won the Battle Of Schick's Corner, hands-down. As long as you get to live your life and do most of what you want, let him think he "won". He has more time on his hands than you to fight. You have building and flying to do. Tussling with his neighbors may be HIS hobby!

[stone_axe]

I'll tell what's wrong with letting him think you won, it means that he has won.

I rambled on in my previous post about the 'nuts and bolts' of this situation, but I didn't understand the bigger picture.

People like this are emotionally disturbed and create situations and scenarios that draw 'normal' people in by baiting them with obviously objectionable behavior. By responding to this individual (even though your response is reasonable/expected) you are playing his game on his terms. The fact that your neighborhood is in a tussle over him is what he wants.

The best revenge is living well.

Don't sink to his level. Don't waste your energy playing his game. The local authorities see what's going on and his 'legal' shenanigans are a bunch of theatrics that they won't enforce.


David

[ctdahle]

When I was a kid we used to all play in the street, Frisbee, football, kick the can, whatever. It was a wide suburban street with big front lawns and no on-street parking, so with lots of kids and very little traffic, the street was a great playground.

We had one neighbor who would go ballistic if the frisbee or whatever landed on his lawn. This didn't happen very often because his yard was toward the end of the block, away from the best play area, but he let the possibility of a frisbee on his lawn ruin his summer evenings. He would sit on his front porch just waiting for a stray Sleek-Streak us to infringe on his domain so he could scream at us.

Of course for us kids, it turned into a game of seeing how close we could come to his property line.

[daron]

hahahah yeah i think we all bin there dun that:))

[jschick]

You all have valid points, but really the funny thing is, this guy is in his 50's I have 2 boys, 3 and 1.5, they will be active outdoor kids (they already love my ATV) and at the time we (my great neighbor and I were friends) we built a track, yep got a table top jump, berms and all, had it proffesionally done, for Us and some other neighbor kids to ride on. Their is no way he can stop the ATV riding now it only goes on like once a month since kids are so young, his kids used it every weekend on my atv 3 yrs ago. but give it a few more years and he will have to live with all the other neighborhood boys, so generally my wife and I sit back and just laugh, cause he complains now but has no idea what he is in for as HE ages.. not to be mean but this IS OUT IN THE COUNTRY. I will never try to irratate him and I may very well move my flying field, not because of him but just for more room. It just really got me upset when he threattend me to take my plane and bust it up if he ever got ahold of it. Luckly my buddy who is a Cop was their. it pissed him off more then me since it was his plane he was yelling at.. i guess I will never understand how a neighbor could be a idiot, I was never raised that way and it is my natural tendancy to help out, as it is with all the other neighbors. OOh and one more note, I only get the chance to fly once or twice a week, for maybe 30 minutes to 1 hr. so thats probably 6 - 8 flights per week... generally its one flight after work some night, then maybe 2 or 3 on Sat and 2 or 3 on Sunday, but I will bet never more then 8 and mostly 0 or 2 per week. so far I flew 3 times the day he went off and 2 flights since, this month so 5 in 16 days.. Geez is that so unreal...

Thanks

[easytiger]

The guy would probably be fine with the right medication. Too sad for him and everybody else. I think you are being wise and reasonable, though, yourself, I've seen other people handle similar situations much more poorly than you. You seem like a good neighbor.

[marshallcowboy]

Well it sounds like you live in the sticks like me. Also being in law enforcement( I work for the local sheriffs dept here) I find that most counties dont have any kind of noise or loud music laws for out in the county like alot of cities do. So you probably dont have much worry about the engine noise, and sounds like ya have an understanding local L.E. agency. Like everyone else has said do your best to ignore him and just enjoy yourself. Just my 2 cents.
Jarrod

[RAFguy]

Man after reading this post, I'm soo glad my nieghbors are cool with my planes. When I first moved to this small town in IL, I jokingly called it "Mayberry". New England is a lot different than the midwest, but in a good way. I fly off the field behind my house, and both nieghbors love comming out and watching. I explained what they were and how I fly and I never fly over established "No Fly Zones" like over houses and cars. They think it's really cool and fun to watch. I'm so glad I have good, helping nieghbors:)

As far as your bad nieghbor, you might be able to get the other nieghbors involved in calming this guy down, or better yet moving. We hate it when the City people come in our farming town and try to change it. I would be afraid this guy would flip out on someones kid or something. Anyway, do what everyone here has said, hope he moves soon.

[billsmithjr]

here 's an idea . go down to the local court house and get what is called a peace order , you will have to pay 50 dollars or so , now your nieghbor can not come out and hasle you or approach your property or have any personal contact with you of any kind with out being arrested and charged. you will have to say in the request that you are in fear of personal harm but this isn't to hard to imagine happening in view of this guys behavior. Just stay within the law other wise and this guy can't do a thing.

[billsmithjr]

and poison those trees you gave him

[J_R]

The information initally asked for in this thread is in an AMA document on the AMA website. Document 526, Model Fliers and thier neighbors at: http://www.modelaircraft.org/templates/ama/PDF-files/526.pdf

To paraphrase it, flying over someone else's land is trespass. Landing on someone else's land is trespass. If you trespass, the landowner is entitled to recourse.

If you land on someone else's property, he may not convert your property, but he is still entitled to recourse.

[ErikU]

This is interesting, I always thought that you do NOT own the airspace over your property..? I can fly full scale over any property I want, so long as I don't land it's not tresspass. Please explain. Thanks.

-Erik

[easytiger]

You certainly CAN own the air over a property...here in NYC, "air rights" are bought and sold all the time, to keep somebody from building a shadow over your building, etc...
You need to stay 500 feet above anybody's property in your full scale, yes?

[J_R]

Originally posted by ErikU
This is interesting, I always thought that you do NOT own the airspace over your property..? I can fly full scale over any property I want, so long as I don't land it's not tresspass. Please explain. Thanks.

-Erik

As the title of the document implies, it is about models, although it does address full scale aircraft as well.

This is an excerpt from the document. I would post the whole thing, but, it won't fit in the space provided. Click the link I posted for a better understanding of all the issues involved.

"The various states apply various theories of recovery to allow their
residents to recover for trespass. Yet, every state would consider the flight of a
model aircraft at ordinary altitudes over the land of another, without invitation, a
trespass. The second theory contained as a flight privilege is intended to aid
passenger craft and other such aircraft and could be interpreted as not allowing any
overflight by hobby models. Therefore, you should continue to urge the AMA
members to avoid any flight over property where no permission has been granted."

[kist2001]

Sounds like your neighbor is a borderline personality disorder. Borderlines only get pleasure when people are arguing and have strife over them. They are very intelligent and manipulative people. No true emotions inside....just a need for drama.

Going to court would fuel this mans need. He would start to fight the holy fight because it would fill a void in his psyche. I would reccomend not to play into his scheme; he will win based on his never-ending devotion to the cause.

If you watched the first season of the Sopranos.....Tony Soprano's mother was a borderline personality disorder. She kept on ratting out people to each-other just to keep herself in the middle of things.

Do not give this guy an argument. Do not try to make peace. He has no true emotions to placate. Alliances will be used to turn others on you with him in the middle. Just keep the planes away and build a high fence. Best of luck, Ken :rolleyes: