The Newsroom

Stockwell Incident

(July 2005)

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MA
Marcus Founding member
cat posted:
I do wonder why Sky haven't bothered to use the 'Skycopter' at all today. Pretty poor effort on that side of things... it would've helped their coverage immensely.

Yet again all the broadcasters are having to make do with maps... apart from the BBC, who have yet again employed their four-mile-away camera, pointing at a block of flats, which has nothing to do with anything.


Maybe thay can't get permission to enter the airspace above the incidents.

Or it could be the pilots day off
GR
gregmc
Marcus posted:
cat posted:
I do wonder why Sky haven't bothered to use the 'Skycopter' at all today. Pretty poor effort on that side of things... it would've helped their coverage immensely.

Yet again all the broadcasters are having to make do with maps... apart from the BBC, who have yet again employed their four-mile-away camera, pointing at a block of flats, which has nothing to do with anything.


Maybe thay can't get permission to enter the airspace above the incidents.

Or it could be the pilots day off


It was over a motorway accident somewhere, it is in use. I saw it around 2ish i think
CA
cat
Eh? What motorway incident?

You're saying they're using it to cover a car crash rather than terrorist events in London? I doubt that, somehow.
GR
gregmc
cat posted:
Eh? What motorway incident?

You're saying they're using it to cover a car crash rather than terrorist events in London? I doubt that, somehow.


Yep, huge tail backs, and many viewers thought the road system was under attack, but it was just a lorry burnt out. and yes they did send the skycopter out to cover it. Belive me, they did, it was around 12.45 and 2.15 cant remember exactly when.
CA
cat
How bizarre. I can only assume then, if it up for that, that the Met won't let them fly over London.
DO
Dog
cat posted:
How bizarre. I can only assume then, if it up for that, that the Met won't let them fly over London.


For the Skycopter to work, there needs to be a tv truck somewhere nearby with the capability to accept the downlink from the helicopter, then uplink it back up to a satellite.

The tv truck at Stockwell might not have been equiped with the right gear to take the signal from the helicopter. Or even if it was, there might not have been a spare path out to feed pictures from it.

Anyway, the Skycopter just appears to be a nuisence. It can't get close enough to show anything much, and even if it tried to, it'd get pulled down by police.

Infact Sky's coverage has been awful the last 2 days: sensationalist crap, reporting and running with rumours that turn out to be totally untrue. This sort of reporting helps noone, and just helps to cause alarm.
JA
jamej
News Report (Well more of an update really) on BBC Two about 20 minutes ago with Sian.
BO
squawkBOX
What would be the range that something like this could broadcast?

I'm thinking back to the MJ trial where there is a helicopter feeding pictures back (to what I assume would be a local station). Although there was lots of breaks in the picture it did fly a fair distance.
ST
steddenm
Dog posted:
cat posted:
How bizarre. I can only assume then, if it up for that, that the Met won't let them fly over London.


For the Skycopter to work, there needs to be a tv truck somewhere nearby with the capability to accept the downlink from the helicopter, then uplink it back up to a satellite.

The tv truck at Stockwell might not have been equiped with the right gear to take the signal from the helicopter. Or even if it was, there might not have been a spare path out to feed pictures from it.

Anyway, the Skycopter just appears to be a nuisence. It can't get close enough to show anything much, and even if it tried to, it'd get pulled down by police.

Infact Sky's coverage has been awful the last 2 days: sensationalist crap, reporting and running with rumours that turn out to be totally untrue. This sort of reporting helps noone, and just helps to cause alarm.


According to the British Air Traffic Control here in Bournemouth, only the Police Helicopter and scheduled flights are currently allowed over London at the moment. The Skycopter was over the M25 and M1 interchange about an hour ago.
(Source: Paul Kitchen, ATCC Bournemouth Airport)
CA
cat
Can't the Skycopter use the BT Tower in London for relaying pictures back? I'm pretty certain that when it comes to flying over London they don't need a sat-truck there and then.

The explosions two weeks ago saw it up and running within 15 minutes, and it certainly proved its worth then, putting them well ahead of the rest; not sure about yesterday, I didn't see it.
JO
Johnnie
cat posted:
Can't the Skycopter use the BT Tower in London for relaying pictures back? I'm pretty certain that when it comes to flying over London they don't need a sat-truck there and then.

The explosions two weeks ago saw it up and running within 15 minutes, and it certainly proved its worth then, putting them well ahead of the rest; not sure about yesterday, I didn't see it.


The Skycopter was used yesterday, mainly over the Oval and Hackney.
NG
noggin Founding member
cat posted:
Can't the Skycopter use the BT Tower in London for relaying pictures back? I'm pretty certain that when it comes to flying over London they don't need a sat-truck there and then.

The explosions two weeks ago saw it up and running within 15 minutes, and it certainly proved its worth then, putting them well ahead of the rest; not sure about yesterday, I didn't see it.


Yep - though there doesn't need to be a sat truck deployed if the receive point is near an inject point. The BBC can downlink the helicopter they use at TV Centre I believe (the East Tower is pretty high up so may be quite good for this) - it would depend on the range of the digital link in use and the location of the helicopter.

It may be that Sky, being further west and having lower buildings, may not have as much luck and have to deploy trucks closer to the helicopter working area - though it might also be possible to arrange for a downlink on the roof in Westminster and feed it back via the circuits Sky presumably have permanently between Millbank and Sky HQ?

Looking at the previous posts I suspect that air space has been restricted given the higher than normal levels of police helicopter activity - so un-scheduled flights aren't possible?

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