FAA Announces Small UAS Registration Rule

[Av8Chuck]

with technology being what it is maybe the solution should be a GPS users' license where you have to put your GPS licensing code into your flight controller's firmware to make the GPS capabilities active. no GPS, no registration, no problems for hobbyist fixed wing and single rotor users.

i could probably reach out to the guys at ALPA that staff this committee and see about injecting a few new ideas into the mix.

How about injecting some common sense.

A lot of this is old news, ALPA has always been against GA, not that flying a drone below 500' is actually GA. But ALPA won't be happy until there is no longer VFR which would cripple the GA industry.

This is not about safety, there's no way the current registration makes any of this safer. RC was flying way above 500' and beyond line of sight long before GPS. In fact the majority of RC flight is still conducted without GPS.

This is about a class of people who think they know more about what another class of people want to do. The overwhelming majority of people whether its ALPA, the FAA, AOPA, name your favorite acronym here, who've never seen a drone in person, let alone flown or really understand anything about how they operate, unilaterally deciding the "rules" for people who want to fly drones.

How many people have died in commercial airline accidents in the past three years? And what percentage of those accidents where a result from an interaction with a drone? And how many people have died in the same time frame as a result of anything to do with a civilian drone?

So if you consider the safety records of the two, then I can understand ALPA's concern. Since they have been culpable for much of the overregulation of GA which has resulted in a huge decline in new pilots, and young people seem to have an insatiable appetite for flying drones its only a matter of time before Pixhawk's find their way into the cockpit of airliners.

 

[Bartman]

How about injecting some common sense.

A lot of this is old news, ALPA has always been against GA, not that flying a drone below 500' is actually GA. But ALPA won't be happy until there is no longer VFR which would cripple the GA industry.

Chuck, What would an otherwise civil conversation be without your condescending tone. Many ALPA members actually also fly GA so why on earth would you suggest ALPA is against GA? If that's your opinion of injecting common sense then I'd hate to see what you consider nonsense.

 

[Bartman]

This is not about safety, there's no way the current registration makes any of this safer.

not safer, i think the attempt was at accountability

 

[Bartman]

So if you consider the safety records of the two, then I can understand ALPA's concern. Since they have been culpable for much of the overregulation of GA which has resulted in a huge decline in new pilots,

Sorry but G/A flying is very unregulated and inexpensive compared to most every other country that allows it. Gas prices and the price of an airplane are the biggest obstacles to GA flying. I can get in a plane any day of the week and go fly around the country if I want to. If anything the FAA has been working with the manned aircraft community to make GA more accessible as we've seen with the recreation pilot license and more recently with the light sport. It's in the FAA's mandate to make general aviation accessible for the general public. Add up fuel, hangar costs, insurance, maintenance, new and used aircraft purchase prices, etc., etc., etc. and it gets expensive. FOr the most part though if you have the money it's there for the taking.

 

[Bartman]

NY Times weighed in on Dec. 10

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/11/business/risk-to-aircraft-from-drones-being-debated.html?_r=1

Risk to Aircraft From Drones Being Debated


By JAD MOUAWADDEC. 10, 2015

Photo

In August, the Federal Aviation Administration said that reports of close calls by pilots had soared, even though F.A.A. rules prohibit drones from being flown near airports. CreditCarlo Allegri/Reuters

• When the pilot of an Alitalia jetliner reported seeing a drone while approaching Kennedy Airport in New York in March 2013, the likelihood of a collision between a drone and a commercial jet seemed pretty remote.
  
  But over the past two years, aviation experts and regulators have become increasingly concerned about the growing number of drones flying near airports and the risks they could potentially create for aviation safety. Last Saturday, for instance, a California Highway Patrol helicopter nearly crashed into a drone and the pilot avoided a collision only because he veered away.
  
  “If you go through the windshield and you hit the pilot, that’s game over,” a highway patrol spokesman, Jim Andrews, told local reporters. “If it goes into the rotor blades, depending on where or what it hits, it could be the same situation.”
  
  But while the number of drones is growing rapidly, their impact on flight safety is still being debated. More than 400,000 drones were sold last year and this year the Consumer Technology Association is forecasting sales of 700,000 more.
  
  
  In August, the Federal Aviation Administration said reports of close calls by pilots had soared, even though F.A.A. rules prohibit flying drones near airports. It reported cases in which commercial pilots had seen drones flying above 10,000 feet and pointed to instances in which firefighters battling wildfires in the western part of the country had to ground their operations after spotting drones nearby.
  
  Drone enthusiasts criticized the agency as sensationalizing the issue as it seeks to regulate it. Critics, for instance, said laser beams pointed at pilots were a far bigger and more malicious threat to commercial aviation.
  There have been more than 5,000 reports of lasers aimed at airplanes, a number that has risen over the past few years, according to pilot representatives. Also, aircraft last year recorded about 13,000 bird strikes, a well-known threat to aviation safety, according to F.A.A. statistics.
  
  The Academy of Model Aeronautics, which represents model plane hobbyists, produced its own report that found that only a tiny number of drones were involved in close encounters with airplanes where pilots had to take evasive action. The F.A.A. itself has found only two instances of possible drone collisions with an aircraft, but has not been able to confirm either episode, according to a spokesman.
  
  But Hulsey Smith, the chief executive of Aero Kinetics, a maker of commercial drones, said the risks of accidentally flying into the path of an airplane or a helicopter was statistically “just a matter of time.”
  
  “The general public has no sense of how dangerous these toys really are,” he said. “If we don’t have an honest conversation about those risks, we could set this industry back years and decades.”
  
  The F.A.A. is considering requiring drone owners to register themselves when they acquire a drone, probably before the end of this year. Regulators are also working on new rules for commercial drone operators, which will be completed next year. Under those rules, drones would be barred from flying above 500 feet, or faster than 100 miles per hour. Operators will also have to maintain a line of sight with drones.
  
  Mr. Smith said that registering drone owners was a necessary first step but not enough. He supports setting up a system to certify a drone’s airworthiness to prove it can operate safely, and possibly equipping drones with costly tracking beacons or collision avoidance systems.
  
  A study by two researchers at the Center for the Study of the Drone, atBard College, due to be released Friday, tries to provide a more comprehensive overview of the risks. The study broadened the definition of close encounter to include incidents in which a drone flew close to a plane, not just those in which a pilot had to take evasive action.
  
  The study reviewed 922 incidents involving drones and manned aircraft in the national airspace over the past two years. These incidents were reported to the F.A.A. and NASA’s Aviation Safety Reporting System, a confidential reporting system for pilots, from December 2013 to September 2015.
  
  The researchers found that 327 incidents or 35 percent of the cases could be described as close encounters, defined as drones coming within 500 feet of aircraft.
  
  In 158 of those cases, a drone came within 200 feet or less of an aircraft, and in 28 instances, a pilot reported having to maneuver to avoid a collision. The study also found 90 close encounters between a commercial jet aircraft and a drone, and 38 involved helicopters.
  
  Arthur Holland Michel, one author of the study, said regulators and policy makers, as well as the public, needed more accurate and impartial data to get a better understanding of the risks.
  
  “The seriousness of the problem is still somewhat up for debate in terms of the particulars,” he said, about whether a drone could bring down a commercial airliner or whether the episodes represent malicious intent.
  
  “But the challenge of integrating drones in the domestic airspace can only be addressed through a combination of solutions,” he said. “And it will take collaboration between the industry, the regulators and the drone users.”
  

 

[Dax]

In response, the following from the FAA site:

"Q. What is the definition of a UAS? Is it different from a drone?


A. A UAS is an unmanned aircraft system. A drone and a UAS are the same for registration purposes.


Q: Does the FAA have the authority to require registration of UAS used by modelers and hobbyists?


A: Yes. By statute all aircraft are required to register. Congress has defined "aircraft" to include UAS, regardless of whether they are operated by modelers and hobbyists."

The FAA's Mandatory Drone Registration Rules are Illegal
Published on Dec 31, 2015
In this interview with drone and sUAS attorneys Enrico Schaefer and Jonathan Rupprecht, the consensus is clear. The FAA's mandatory drone registration rules violate Section 336 of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 and the Administrative Procedures Act. A legal analysis of the registration rule by drone attorney Jonathan Rupprecht.

 

[Old Man]

DAX,

We know they are illegal. The question is, who has the money to hire the attorneys after some misinformed LEO stops you while you're flying, takes your info, turns it over to the FAA with a claim of careless and reckless, who then starts an Administrative action, and you have to take off work to do battle with the FAA over illegal laws? Lawsuits can have some nice settlements if you have the cash necessary to survive for the three years of the initial court battle and the next 5-10 years of appeals.

When dealing with a government that breaks the law to enforce an illegal law it's difficult to have any faith in the legal system because the foundation of that system, the government, has demonstrated that it it lawless and no longer follows the Constitutional process. We're in a situation to something similar to where a snake eats its own tail. Ideally, a large group of multirotor owners would get together to file a class action suit against the FAA/DOT, with personal actions against those that signed the FAA documents implementing this crud.

I doubt that will happen because independent people fear going head to head with their government because of all those things a government can do to a person where they can't fight back. The IRS and conservative groups is a perfect example, with the Justice Dept. and the Associated Press being another. I did not see anywhere in the video where the drone lawyer requested people to contact him to initiate a legal action, but I did see ads to buy the books he has written.

For now, just don't register.

 

[violetwolf]

with technology being what it is maybe the solution should be a GPS users' license where you have to put your GPS licensing code into your flight controller's firmware to make the GPS capabilities active. no GPS, no registration, no problems for hobbyist fixed wing and single rotor users.

i could probably reach out to the guys at ALPA that staff this committee and see about injecting a few new ideas into the mix.

I like this idea a lot.

 

[Old Man]

I'm all for some sensible form of rules for multirotor users, most of which, IMO, would initiate with some level of aeronautical knowledge and operator training, but the knee jerk reaction to things that are very, very light in substantiation make no sense to me. Nor does a government agency imposing edicts that have no basis in legality.

We have pilot reports of near misses but no descriptions of drone appearance or estimated size in those reports. Without those one cannot begin to estimate a separation distance. We have reports of near misses without a means of communicating with the person(s) that allegedly saw the drone, so from an evidence perspective, there is no evidence but lots of hearsay. No videos of a near miss or close encounter, but plenty of evidence of police helicopters indicating a near miss was initiated by the pilot of the police helicopter as they chased down the drone in an attempt to identify something that had previously been too small and far away to identify. Of course they said the drone put them at risk, they certainly would not admit they were the ones precipitating careless and reckless flight.

Let's see, we also have actions of a national security agency employee flying and crashing a drone onto the White House lawn, being flown almost dead center in an air defense no fly zone, which went unpunished even after being nationally televised. How does someone that should have a clear understanding of the law avoid legal retribution, unless such an act was intentionally staged to generate public outrage with drones and their operators? We might mention that the greatest drone dangers to date near the White House and the associated No Fly Zone have been the result of military drone technology gone awry. Shoot, the Army even managed to crash a Shadow surveillance drone well outside of it's permitted flight area, impacting relatively close to a public school.

Why are many of the people chairing and staffing FAA drone regulatory development groups employed by U.S. aerospace corporations, some of which are operating commercially in U.S. airspace? Why are all the meeting discussions being held in secret, deliberately preventing the American public from learning of what may befall them before the decisions are made that will have significant impact on them?

Why is AOPA, as recent as two years ago vociferous in their condemnation of unmanned flight systems, suddenly placing information in their nationally distributed magazine of their interest in having drone users contact them for training? Why is DJI voluntarily placing No Fly Zone software on their flight controllers that restricts airspace on a world wide basis? Worse, they are not using aviation data bases with accurate airspace information.

Does anyone else smell money on the move yet?

 

[Vection]

Does anyone else smell money on the move yet?

Yea, it's the reins of the 1% who control the government and this country, not our "elected" puppet politicians. I've been smelling it since Reagan encouraged the Service Sector (wage slave) economy and Market (screw the consumer) Economics.

 

[glider]

FAA is being sued, but Big Drone and AMA is not supporting him.
http://diydrones.com/profiles/blogs/faa-sued-in-federal-court-by-model-aircraft-hobbyist#comments

Those interested can support John Taylor here:
http://fund.dcdrone.org/

 

[Keystow]

1.) When the regulations state that you can't fly over private property, isn't private property basically anywhere other than your friends 10 acre ranch or AMA required RC field?

2.) Should I even attempt this hobby if such regulations are in place?

3.) I see people asking about FPV units and suggestions on what to use - per the regulations aren't these basically banned?

 

[John Doecliff]

Yes and no. I get what your saying but there's still plenty of room to enjoy this hobby without worrying about breaking the law. Technically FPV could be looked at as illegal because your supposed to maintain visual contact with the craft at all times but it is not banned specifically. I don't think that would stop me from flying FPV as long as I was being safe. There is no effort to enforce of prosecute people using FPV. Most cops probably don't know what the rules are. I don't believe there has been any landmark ruling that settles the issue once and for all, you can still purchase and use FPV systems without fear of being on the wrong side of the law. There are tons of areas to fly as long as your not interfering with someone else so I wouldn't worry about that either.

 

[Giovanni59]

What's up with people posting advertisements here?

 

[SamaraMedia]

Almost got excited! Oh well, guess I have to wait for 333 approval after all

 

[jetkrazee]

What's up with people posting advertisements here?

Just reported it as "spam".

 

[ProfEngr]

Rebecca needs to get banned by whoever is still an admin on here. The new forum filters don't seem to be working either with the volume of spam threads I've been seeing and they don't get deleted for awhile. Guess Bart really has been busy w/ his personal life.

 

[jetkrazee]

Rebecca needs to get banned by whoever is still an admin on here. The new forum filters don't seem to be working either with the volume of spam threads I've been seeing and they don't get deleted for awhile. Guess Bart really has been busy w/ his personal life.

Indeed she does.

 

[violetwolf]

Bart has abandoned ship... He sold the forum and the new owners seem MIA as well :/

Hopefully they get on top of this soon, I can hear crickets chirping already

 

[jetkrazee]

Bart has abandoned ship... He sold the forum and the new owners seem MIA as well :/

Hopefully they get on top of this soon, I can hear crickets chirping already

That sucks.