Latest news with #Akemann
CBS News
13-02-2025
- CBS News
Culver City man pleads guilty to drone crash into Super Scooper during Palisades Fire
A Culver City man pleaded guilty Wednesday to recklessly operating a drone that crashed into and damaged a Super Scooper firefighting aircraft battling the Palisades Fire last month. Peter Tripp Akemann, 56, entered his plea to a federal class-A misdemeanor count of unsafe operation of an unmanned aircraft, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office. "Lack of common sense and ignorance of your duty as a drone pilot will not shield you from criminal charges," said Akil Davis, the assistant director in charge of the FBI's Los Angeles Field Office. At the time of the collision, the Federal Aviation Administration had issued temporary flight restrictions that prohibited drone operations near the Los Angeles County wildfires. The drone collided into a Canadair CL-415 Super Scooper the Government of Quebec had supplied to Los Angeles firefighters, which was carrying two crewmembers when it was struck on Jan. 9, authorities said. No one was injured but the crash left a hole in the left wing of the aircraft, putting it out of service for "approximately" five days as it was repaired for just over $65,000. As part of his plea agreement, Akemann agreed to pay full restitution to the government of Quebec, which supplied the plane, and an aircraft repair company that handled the necessary fixes. Akemann also agreed to complete 150 hours of community service in support of the 2025 Southern California wildfire relief effort. "Please respect the law, respect the FAA's rules and respect our firefighters and the residents they are protecting by keeping your drone at home during wildfires," Davis said. In his plea agreement, Akemann admitted to his reckless and illegal conduct in flying the drone that posed an imminent safety hazard to the Super Scooper crew. According to the plea agreement, while the wildfire was burning on Jan. 9, Akemann drove to the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica and parked his vehicle on the top floor of the parking structure. He then launched a drone and flew it toward Pacific Palisades to get a look at Palisades Fire damage. Federal prosecutors say Akemann flew the drone more than 1.5 miles toward the fire and lost sight of the remotely piloted unit. The impact of the drone crash caused a roughly 3-inch-by-6-inch hole in the left wing. After landing, maintenance personnel identified the damage and took the aircraft out of service for repairs, court papers show.
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- Yahoo
Man pleads guilty to crashing drone into firefighting plane
LOS ANGELES (KTLA) – A 56-year-old Culver City man has agreed to plead guilty to 'recklessly operating a drone' that ended up crashing into and damaging a Super Scooper as it was fighting the Palisades Fire earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Friday. In the plea agreement, Peter Tripp Akemann admitted to 'illegal conduct in flying the drone that posed an imminent safety hazard to the Super Scooper crew,' the DOJ stated in a news release. The collision damaged the wing of the SuperScooper Quebec 1 on Jan. 9, forcing it to be taken out of service two days after the fire erupted. 'This defendant recklessly flew an aircraft into airspace where first responders were risking their lives in an attempt to protect lives and property,' said acting U.S. Attorney Joseph T. McNally. 'As this case demonstrates, we will track down drone operators who violate the law and interfere with the critical work of our first responders.' Investigators determined that while the wildfire was burning in and around Pacific Palisades, Akemann drove to the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica and launched his drone from the top floor of the parking structure to observe damage caused by the fire. With federal prosecutors filing the offense as a misdemeanor, Akemann could face up to one year in federal prison. 'As part of the plea agreement, Akemann agreed to pay full restitution to the Government of Quebec, which supplied the plane, and an aircraft repair company that repaired the plane,' the DOJ stated. The costs to repair the plane were at least $65,000, according to the release. Akemann will also have to complete 150 hours of community service supporting the 2025 Southern California wildfire relief effort as part of the agreement. The Palisades Fire broke out on Jan. 7, spreading quickly amid severely windy conditions before charring nearly 24,000 acres and destroying thousands of homes. The firefight has sparked controversy over the Los Angeles Fire Department's staffing and water supplies, which firefighters reported were running dry. Officials say 12 people were killed in the blaze, the cause of which is believed to have 'human' origins, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- Yahoo
Former Skydance Interactive President Pleads Guilty to Piloting Drone That Crashed Into Plane During Palisades Fire
Peter Akemann, the former president of Skydance Interactive, has pleaded guilty to flying the drone that collided with and subsequently grounded a Canadian Super Scooper firefighting plane as the Palisades fires raged on Jan. 9. Akemann, who worked with Skydance's video game and virtual reality arm starting in 2016 and recently left his role, agreed to a guilty plea of one count of unsafe operation of an unmanned aircraft. The charge, a misdemeanor, could result in a sentence of up to one year in federal prison, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California announced on Friday. More from The Hollywood Reporter An Artist's Historic House In Pacific Palisades Was Lost In the Fire. He Hopes to Rebuild My Own Private Palisades: A Writer Remembers His Vanished Neighborhood Where L.A.'s Wealthiest Evacuees Are Fleeing After the Fires The Jan. 9 collision of a DJI Mini 3 Pro with a firefighting aircraft provided by the government of Quebec to help L.A. battle its destructive wildfires made national headlines. The crash damaged a wing of the Canadair CL-415 Super Scooper, so called because it can fly low over water sources and ladle over one thousand gallons of water to dump on a fire, and grounded the plane for days. Per the plea agreement, Akemann launched the drone from the top floor of a parking garage near Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade on Jan. 9 in an attempt to survey the fire ravaging the Pacific Palisades. But he lost track of the drone once he had flown it more than a mile and a half away from its starting point, after which it collided with the Canadian aircraft being manned by two crew members. By this point, Federal Aviation Administration temporary flight restrictions barring drones from flying near the ongoing L.A.-area wildfires were already in effect. Akemann had already left his Skydance role at the time. 'This defendant recklessly flew an aircraft into airspace where first responders were risking their lives in an attempt to protect lives and property,' Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph T. McNally said in a statement on Friday. 'This damage caused to the Super Scooper is a stark reminder that flying drones during times of emergency poses an extreme threat to personnel trying to help people and compromises the overall ability of police and fire to conduct operations. As this case demonstrates, we will track down drone operators who violate the law and interfere with the critical work of our first responders.' Akemann's defense attorneys, Glen T. Jonas and Vicki Podberesky, said he is 'deeply sorry' for the incident in a statement. 'He accepts responsibility for his grave error in judgment, and is cooperating with the government in effort to make amends,' the statement reads. 'There are a number of mitigating factors that will come to light during the court proceedings including Mr. Akemann's reliance on the DJI Drone's geo fencing safeguard feature and the failure of that feature.' The U.S. Attorney's office notes that the damage to the aircraft's wing cost the Quebec government and an aircraft repairs company at least $65,169. As part of the plea agreement, Akemann agreed to cover those costs and complete 150 hours of community service to help aid Southern California wildfire relief efforts. Akemann, a graduate of the University of California San Diego who holds a PhD from the University of California Berkeley, co-founded the video game developer Treyarch (which worked on Spider-Man and Call of Duty 2: Big Red One, among other titles) and The Workshop Entertainment (behind Sorcery and Borderlands 2: Mr. Torgue's Campaign of Carnage). He joined Skydance in 2016 after the entertainment company acquired The Workshop and launched an interactive division that has since produced titles like Skydance's Behemoth and The Walking Dead: Saints & Sinners. Best of The Hollywood Reporter Most Anticipated Concert Tours of 2025: Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar & SZA, Sabrina Carpenter and More Hollywood's Highest-Profile Harris Endorsements: Taylor Swift, George Clooney, Bruce Springsteen and More Most Anticipated Concert Tours of 2024: Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny, Olivia Rodrigo and More
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- Yahoo
Man pleads guilty to flying drone that struck fire-fighting plane during Palisades fire
Jan. 31 (UPI) -- A California man has agreed to plead guilty to recklessly operating a drone that crashed into and damaged a "Super Scooper" firefighting aircraft during the deadly Palisades fire near Los Angeles, prosecutors announced Friday. Peter Tripp Akemann, 56, of Culver City, Calif., was set to plead guilty to one misdemeanor count of unsafe operation of an unmanned aircraft carrying a sentence of up to one year in federal prison during an appearance Friday in U.S. District Court in downtown Los Angeles, according to the Justice Department. Akemann is accused of launching his drone from the top floor of a Santa Monica, Calif., parking garage on Jan. 9 and sending it toward the raging wildfire in neighboring Pacific Palisades, where it collided with a Canadian government-owned CL-415 super scooper aircraft carrying two crew members who were attempting to fight the blaze. Prosecutors said the impact punched a hole in the aircraft's left wing, forcing firefighters to take it out of service for repairs in the midst of their frantic efforts to contain the massive fire, which killed 12 people and injured at least four others, including one firefighter, while consuming nearly 23,500 acres. Akemann flew his drone despite temporary flight restrictions imposed by the Federal Aviation Administration in the wildfire area, demonstrating with authorities called a "lack of common sense" and "ignorance of duty." "This defendant recklessly flew an aircraft into airspace where first responders were risking their lives in an attempt to protect lives and property," said acting U.S. Attorney Joseph McNally. "This damage caused to the Super Scooper is a stark reminder that flying drones during times of emergency poses an extreme threat to personnel trying to help people and compromises the overall ability of police and fire to conduct operations. "As this case demonstrates, we will track down drone operators who violate the law and interfere with the critical work of our first responders." Akemann has agreed to complete 150 hours of community service in support of the 2025 Southern California wildfire relief effort, officials said.
Yahoo
31-01-2025
- Yahoo
Man to admit to using drone that collided with Super Scooper during Palisades Fire
A Southern California man admitted to operating a drone that collided with a firefighting airplane during the Palisades Fire as the blaze was charring tens of thousands of acres earlier this month, officials said Friday. Peter Tripp Akemann, a 56-year-old Culver City man, agreed to plead guilty to one count of unsafe operation of an unmanned aircraft, according to court documents. Akemann went to the third floor of the Third Street Promenade parking garage on Jan. 9, launched his drone and lost sight of it before it collided with a Super Scooper on loan from Quebec, officials said. "Firefighters were desperately trying to stop the destruction being caused by the fires and save lives. Critical to those efforts were firefighting aircraft that were conducting all-out assaults in the area surrounding the wildfires," Acting U.S. Attorney Joseph McNally told reporters on Friday. 'Contrary to law and basic common sense, some individuals were recklessly operating drones around the firefighting relief efforts." The collision caused a 3-by-6-inch hole in the plane, officials said. Though it was able to land safely, that hole knocked the Super Scooper out of service for several days during the heart of firefighting efforts. Akemann is expected to appear in federal court about 4 p.m. ET on Friday, officials said. Akemann could face up to a year behind bars, though defense attorney Vicki Podberesky said she doesn't believe her client, who 'accepts responsibility for his grave error in judgement,' will be sent to prison for this misdemeanor. The defendant had relied on a "geo-fencing safeguard feature" on the drone that failed that day, his lawyer said. "We believe that there are mitigating circumstances that would warrant a lenient sentence," Podberesky said Friday. The Palisades Fire ignited on the morning of Jan. 7, had torched more than 23,000 acres by Friday and was 98% contained, according to California fire authorities. At least 29 people were killed as flames from the Pasadies and Easton Fires in the Palisades neighborhood of L.A. and Altadena, north of downtown, blew through the region with horrifically astonishing speed. Some of Southern California's most desired real estate — on beaches and in canyons and hills — went up in smoke during a terrifying week earlier this month. Those twin blazes posted once-in-lifetime challenges for firefighters who often had no water due to the extreme demand to douse so many flames at one article was originally published on
