from Hacker News

Can I stop drone delivery companies flying over my property?

by austinallegro on 6/2/25, 7:15 PM with 324 comments

• by Balgair on 6/2/25, 9:25 PM

  Aside:

  It's going to be a great time when the crows, raccoons, and other semi-intelligent wildlife discover that these drones have food in them at seemingly random reward schedules.

  Sure, you can give the drones little tasers to keep the animals away, depending on your locality. But knowing what I know about bears and crows, almost nothing is going to stop them. Especially when some influencer jerk tries tempting a bunch of them with a box just oozing honey or some other high value food.

• by Aziell on 6/3/25, 1:49 AM

  I live in a pretty quiet neighborhood, and I’m not thrilled about the idea of drones flying over my backyard all the time. There’s something really jarring about sitting outside and suddenly hearing that loud buzzing overhead. I don’t think anyone’s really asked regular people how they feel about this kind of thing.

• by SoftTalker on 6/2/25, 7:43 PM

  In my neighborhood (rural) a drone hovering over someone's property would be likely used as target practice.

  If delivery drones become commonplace, there are going to have to be regulations about which air corridors they can use (altitude and routes) or it will be chaos.

• by neepi on 6/2/25, 7:49 PM

  Clearly the solution is to obtain anti delivery drone drones and bag all the free stuff that falls out of the sky into your property.

• by paulddraper on 6/2/25, 7:39 PM

  Has a very easy answer in the US: No.

  You do not own your airspace. The FAA owns your airspace.

  You can build a tall structure (subject to local laws). But anything above that is outside your control.

  ---

  This article, however, is about Ireland.

• by Havoc on 6/3/25, 12:04 PM

  I'd much prefer a sensible regulated approach over straight to nimby.

  Legislating low noise propellers etc.

  Drones make a lot of sense versus having a 2 ton truck drive around to hand you a package. Much better if we figure out a workable solution here

• by jbattle on 6/3/25, 2:30 AM

  I dread the idea. The leaf blowers running nonstop 10 months a year are noisy enough.

  Maybe I can convince all my neighbors to fly barrage balloons in all the back yards.

• by Brian_K_White on 6/3/25, 12:45 AM

  The current ambiguity will magically find itself disambiguated pretty soon after we have our own drones camp out over politician's own homes, in numbers.

• by Yeul on 6/2/25, 8:13 PM

  How is drone delivery economically feasible? The carry weight is negligible, the range is paltry and they still require operators- whom I'm sure earn more than your average white van man.

• by deepsun on 6/2/25, 11:31 PM

  Discuss it with your city/county council. If it annoys enough people, you might introduce regulations, aka making agreement with the drone operators.

• by monkaiju on 6/2/25, 11:07 PM

  I really hope this type of delivery never catches on... I live in a fairly urban location and still get to do great birdwatching in my backyard.

  Woodpeckers, hummingbirds, geese and ducks flying over between the various lakes. Losing out on that just so Amazon can make more money (not to mention potentially spy on us even more effectively) would be tragic

• by _carbyau_ on 6/3/25, 12:28 AM

  My concern is less the occasional drone and more when Google decides that all their delivery drones - already carrying cameras/radar/lidar for navigational purposes - can be used to update google maps in near realtime.

  The sheer Big Brother possibilities are insane.

  The future: "saferoom is where the pants aren't"

• by Sohcahtoa82 on 6/3/25, 5:15 PM

  My question is...why would you want to?

  Throughout the comments, it sounds like people are expecting these drones to only be ~50 feet above the ground, buzzing right over houses, or being a noisy nuisance hovering in place endlessly.

  Maybe it's because I live in an area with lots of tall trees, but I'd expect these drones to be flying at least 200 feet up. At that height, it becomes difficult to hear the drone unless you're in an incredibly quiet rural area.

  And it's not like a drone is going to hang around. It'll deliver its package and then head back to base to charge and/or pick up another package.

• by Joker_vD on 6/3/25, 5:45 AM

  waves his hands right before your nose "The air is common! I am not touching you!"

  Well, it's still obnoxious. Either fly over the roads, or fly high enough (50 m? 100?) to be unreachable.

• by fifticon on 6/2/25, 8:10 PM

  well, if you are russian, it appears not.

• by paulcole on 6/3/25, 1:46 AM

  This is one of the very best examples of a situation where you can exercise and improve your ability to just let it go and move on with your life.

• by victorbjorklund on 6/3/25, 9:06 AM

  I just dont understand why we are doing this. Delievery within a city is a solved issue. Wanna get rid of humans? self-driving cars.

• by pmarreck on 6/3/25, 3:12 AM

  Pretty soon they will be using more silent rotors, which already exist and for some-odd reason aren't yet used in the drone space

• by rolph on 6/2/25, 8:02 PM

  drones have minimum distance and altitude regulations as well as restrictions from operating above people.

  also, stock up on fishing line

• by friendlyprezz on 6/2/25, 10:50 PM

  There sure is one way to stop em

  Palmer lucky made another way too, an EMP that looks like a portable speaker

• by renewiltord on 6/3/25, 2:02 AM

  One of the things I find incredibly annoying is that delivery drivers will drive by my home even when they're not delivering to me. Did they even ask for my consent? Once they have self-driving cargo vans, I'm just going to shoot out their tires so they can't spy on me.

  Or that's what I would sound like if I was a looneybin.

• by GuestFAUniverse on 6/2/25, 7:39 PM

  Don't overthink it: get a permission for one or many flag poles ;-)

• by mediumsmart on 6/3/25, 5:28 AM

  Probably, but what are you going to do with all the stuff?

• by antithesizer on 6/2/25, 10:52 PM

  my advice on this question is the same as my advice on most questions: befriend the crows.

• by Bluescreenbuddy on 6/2/25, 11:33 PM

  Not in the US. Property owners do not own the airspace above their property.

• by simplesimon890 on 6/3/25, 2:35 AM

  I live in the path of the drones mentioned in the article and it's an incredibly frustrating experience to be outside and have them fly over the property. they are noisy, intrusive, and increasingly more frequent ( maybe a pass nearby every half hour on a busy day )

  Living in an urban environment always will entail some unwanted sounds, dogs barking, passing cars, the occasional helicopter or whatever, but to have a drone passing over your neighborhood to deliver someone coffee or a parcel feels like exploiting every possible avenue to make money, regardless of how disruptive it is to the local population.

  However bad they are now, it will be 10x the number of drones in a few years. It's a depressing thought.... but hey, at least someone gets their shitty coffee and adds a few euro to the profit of some company so it'll all be worth it in the end.

• by Fairburn on 6/2/25, 8:09 PM

  I hear that a focused low power EMP zot can do wonders .. /s