My Mini Arrow is a Drone?

I would like to tell everyone about what happened to my buddy and I while we were flying at our regular spot. I was flying my Mini Arrow and my buddy, Matt from Celtic Drones, was flying one of his five inch quads. I have the Arrow set up with runcam only because I don't yet own a HD camera, and I'm using the Eachine EV800D goggles set up on a tripod, because I like to transition from FPV to line of sight while I fly. One of the benefits of putting my goggles on a tripod is that I can share the flight experience with curious onlookers so they can see what flying FPV is all about, and that is what happened on this occasion. I don't know if everyone has had this happen to them, but Matt and I are pretty used to people coming up to us while we fly and ask questions, and we are always happy to answer the best we can. We believe that if they could see what we see, they would understand why we love it so much.

It was on my second flight of the day, and I was already seven minutes into it when a lady approached and asked if she could see what was going on. I said "Sure" and transitioned to line of sight flying so she could watch the screen. After about another minute my timer beeped and I let her know that I was bringing it for a landing. When I retrieved the plane she looked it over and asked the usual questions like "What's the cost of something like this" and "Where do you get the building materials" which I replied that it was built from Dollar Tree foamboard using plans I downloaded from Flite Test. I then let her know the power systems can also be obtained from Flite Test or hobby shops and the FPV gear could be found from online stores like Get FPV. 

It was her next question that threw me off.

"So it's a drone?" she said.

I chuckled a bit with my answer "Well, it's a radio controlled airplane."

"But it does have a the same capabilities as a drone." she replied.

"It's nowhere near the same as a military type drone," I said "It's the same R/C airplane technology that has been around for years, but you put a camera on it and suddenly it becomes a drone?"

She nodded her head in agreement, still looking over the little wing. By that time Matt's quad flight was done and he brought it in for a landing. She walked up to his quad to get a closer look and I thought to myself that she would definitely consider that to be bad in some way, so I explained off the bat what it was she was looking at.

"Now that is the latest advancement in R/C aircraft right there." I said "With a motor and propeller at each corner, he no longer needs a rudder, elevator, or even wings for controlled flight, and he can do awesome aerobatics too!"

After a minute or two she thanked us for our time and walked away, but I thought I should have asked her why she thought my airplane was a drone and what she had heard about them. I just get the feeling sometimes that our hobby is under attack by people who believe that R/C planes and quads are dangerous or that we as enthusiasts are looking to do nefarious things with our equipment. For that reason I am glad that I have my camera on a tripod and can share the experience with others and hopefully I was able to change the mind of the lady who thought my Arrow was a drone.

Does any of this sound familiar to you? What things have been said to you about R/C flying and how have you responded? I would be curious to know.

If you would like to see some runcam footage of my first flight that day, check out this video I put together!

Thanks for reading my story and I hope you enjoyed it.

Happy Flying!