Monthly Archives: December 2014

UAV073 FAA says Go, NYC says NO

Gray Eagle UAS

The FAA issues more exemptions, the NPRM might affect hobbyists, NYC looks at banning drones, agriculture eager to get started, Fort Bliss is building a drone port, and drone videos for the holidays.

News

FAA Grants Five More Commercial UAS Exemptions

The FAA granted five regulatory exemptions for unmanned aircraft system (UAS) operations to four companies under Section 333 of the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012. The four companies that received exemptions want to fly UAS to perform operations for aerial surveying, construction site monitoring, and oil rig flare stack inspections.

The FAA determined that the UAS in the proposed operations do not need an FAA-issued certificate of airworthiness because they do not pose a threat to national airspace users or national security.

The FAA has a backlog of 167 requests for exemptions from commercial entities.

House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Subcommittee on Aviation, U.S. Unmanned Aircraft Systems: Integration, Oversight, and Competitiveness

FAA Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety Margaret Gilligan explained that the FAA implemented a Designated Airworthiness Representative (DAR) program which will permit Test Site designees to issue experimental certificates for unmanned aircraft.

To help the test sites develop the capability to assess unmanned aircraft and issue these certificates, the FAA developed both online and in-person training. Once test site designees have completed FAA training, they will be authorized to work within this new program.

Drone downer: Will new FAA rules ground recreational fliers?

Congress in 2012 exempted hobbyists from new FAA rules – provided they adhere to, among other things, the safety code of a community-based organization, such as the 170,000 member AMA. But there are are an estimated 300,000 non-members flying hobbyist aircraft who are largely unaware of hobbyist association safety codes.

NYC lawmaker wants to ban drones except for cops with warrants

Councilman Dan Garodnick introduced a bill banning use of all drones except for those operated by police officers with warrants:

No person may avigate a UAV within the limits of the city except:

  1. The police department in accordance with section 14-133.1.
  2. A person avigating such UAV pursuant to and within the limits of an express authorization by the Federal Aviation Administration.

Councilman Paul Vallone introduced a different bill that is less aggressive. It lists 10 instances where operating a UAV would be illegal, including at night, out of the operator’s line of sight, or above 400 ft high. Otherwise, hobbyists and commercial interests would be free to fly drones.

UAV Industry About to Take Off for Ag

At the recent Indiana/Illinois Farm Show, there was big interest in drones. Agricultural applications of UAV technology are taking place in Canada and Europe because drone use is not illegal. U.S. farmers are being cautious until the FAA creates regulations for commercial use, but several exhibitors at the Show were offering UAVs for sale. At price points between $1,200 and  $25,000, growers were advised to start low and evaluate the systems before making large investments.

Fort Bliss builds Gray Eagle UAV complex

The “droneport” will have a 50,000 square foot hangar and flight facility for the MQ-1C Gray Eagle, an upgraded Predator. The Gray Eagle has a Heavy Fuel Engine (HFE), which can support various types of fuels. With the hangar will come a 5,000 foot runway, taxiways and aprons. A 1,000 foot runway will be made for the RQ-7 Shadows.

Program to Address Growing Need for Drone Operators

In the spring 2015 semester, Florida State University plans to launch the “Introduction to Unmanned Aircraft Systems” course as part of the new Application of Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems program. It’s part of the University’s Emergency Management and Homeland Security (EMHS) program.

Videos of the Week

Christmas on Wendhurst

A drone’s eye view of an amazing Christmas display shot by Daryl Watkins.

Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens Deck the Hall 2014 Aerial Video

Andrew Cross created a Christmas display video of the Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens using a DJI Phantom 2 with a 3D gimbal and GoPro 3+, and a Tarot 810 Hexacopter with a gimbaled Sony NEX5T.

Airbus A310 by MM – indoor airshow Leipzig

This 1/22 scale Airbus is flown indoors. It has a 2 meter wingspan and weighs 284 gms. The fuselage is filled with helium to help keep the weight down.

UAV072 Drone for the Holidays

Arca Space AirStrato

A new civilian HALE, 12 drones for the holidays, where to fly your drone in the UK and Canada, drone near misses and hits, and a holiday video of the week.

News

Arca Space Announces New Range of High-Altitude UAVs

New Mexico-based Arca Space Corporation announced the AirStrato line of electric HALE (High Altitude Long Endurance) UAVs. These fill a gap between large, expensive military unmanned aerial vehicles and small, inexpensive civilian commercial drones. The target market is small-scale businesses and research institutions.

The Twelve Drones of Christmas

FlightBots.com picked their favorite drones for the holiday season:

  1. Quadcopter Q4 Nano – A very small RTF.
  2. Hubsan X4 HD – A low cost little starter drone quadcopter with HD 2MP Camera.
  3. Hubsan X4 H107D FPV – An out of the box basic first person view (FPV) starter drone.
  4. Blade 180 QX HD ready to fly (RTF) – A low cost starter drone for aerial photography.
  5. Parrot AR.Drone 2.0 Elite – Control this using your smartphone or tablet.
  6. Quanum Nova – Outperforms other drone in its price range.
  7. Walkera QR X350 PRO – An RTF FPV Quadcopter that generally costs less than competing products.
  8. DJI Phantom 2 Vision+ – The easy to fly all-in-one consumer drone with advanced software.
  9. 3DR IRIS+ – For real consumer and professional applications.
  10. 3DR X8+ – A real workhorse with modular design and autonomous delivery capabilities.
  11. Walkera Scout X4 – Features include the ability change from quadcopter with 4 motors to octocopter with 8 motors, real time telemetry and flight times up to 25 minutes.
  12. DJI Inspire 1- Carbon fiber arms lift out of sight, 360 degree view, 4K video, 12 megapixel photos.

Where you can and can’t fly a drone

The niche hobby has turned mainstream, and that means lots of new drone pilots after the holidays. What are the rules in the UK?

TGI Friday’s Dumb Mistletoe Drone Cut Somebody’s Face Open

TGI Friday’s idea for drones carrying mistletoe inside the restaurant has already resulted in an accident. During a demonstration for the Brooklyn Daily, the pilot encouraged the reporter to let him land the drone on her hand. She flinched and the drone struck a photographer in the face.

Pilots fear private drones after Heathrow near-miss

The UK Airprox Board (UKAB) is expected to release its report on December 12 about the Heathrow Airport incident earlier this year where an Airbus A320 with passengers had a close encounter with a civilian drone.

Near-collisions between drones, airliners surge, new FAA reports show

Reports of near collisions between unmanned and manned aircraft continue to be reported to the FAA by commercial pilots, private pilots, and air traffic controllers. Since June 1, there have been 25 such encounters of small drones coming “within a few seconds or a few feet of crashing into much larger aircraft.”

The list is available from The Washington Post in Near Mid-Air Collisions With Drones.

The Government Admits Drone Rules Won’t Be Ready Until at Least 2017

The FAA was given until September 2015 to establish regulations that integrate UAS into the National Airspace. The The Government Accountability Office (GAO) says the rules won’t be in place until 2017 or later.

Video of the Week

This Drone Video of Synchronized Holiday Lights Is the Most American Thing Ever

A subdivision in the American Southwest synced up a neighborhood-spanning light show to Trans Siberian Orchestra’s “Wizards of Winter,” ​and filmed the whole thing with a drone.

Feedback

DroneIQ – How to freely operate a commercial or research drone in Canada

By freelance reporter and UAV enthusiast William Levasseur. This video provides details about the new Transport Canada regulations for commercial UAV operations.

DroneIQ – Why the Transport Canada UAV exemption is useless

This follow-on video explains why the Transport Canada definition for “built-up area” might make the new exemption useless for anything other than surveying very remote farmland or working in the wilderness.

UAV071 Are Strict sUAS Regulations Better Than No Regulations?

SkySpecsShould we be satisfied with strict regulations if that will allow commercial operation of UAVs to begin? Also: The FAA looks to focus on drone certification and pilot standards, Canada makes it easier to fly small UAVs, UAS pilot training, model aircrafters getting swept up in drone regulations, and a proposal to allow drones to fly in US National Parks.

Guest

Ryan MortonRyan Morton is a roboticist. He’s the Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer of SkySpecs, which produces innovative drone technologies that help pilots focus on the mission without worrying about what they might crash into next. SkySpecs is also working with various government agencies to integrate drones into the airspace.

Ryan was recently interviewed for the Wired article, The FAA’s Drone Rules Are Too Narrow, But They’re Better Than Nothing.

Ryan is a veteran of the USAF and graduated from both the California Polytechnic State University San Luis Obispo and the University of Michigan. He was a member of the winning team at MAGIC 2010, a US/Australian-funded multi-robot exploration competition wherein (mostly) autonomous ground-based robots explored an unknown environment and detected various objects of interest.

At the Executive Order 12866 meeting at the White House with the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Ryan had the opportunity to assist Lisa Ellman and others from McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP (MLA), as well as another industry startup, Measure, in discussing some views on sUAS integration. One of those is that stalling the process to get the UAS regulations “perfect” from the start is a mistake. Instead, we should implement some regulations now, even if overly restrictive, then iterate.

The excellent MLA blog Plane-ly Spoken covers topics such as recent decisions and litigation, legal trends, airworthiness directives, regulatory interpretations, FAA counsel opinions, and FAA enforcement actions.

News

Huerta Says UAS Rules Stress Certification, Pilot Standards

FAA Administrator Michael Huerta reconfirms that the FAA intends to issue the proposed small UAS regulations by year-end. He says, “I can’t say what is going to be in it but broadly speaking, what we are looking at are all the questions relating to how we certify the aircraft and what are the qualifications of the operator as well as what uses they can be put to.”

New rules for small unmanned aircraft: Transport Canada makes it easier to fly small UAVs for work and research

Transport Canada released Advisory Circular (AC) No. 600-004, Guidance Material for Operating Unmanned Air Vehicle Systems under an Exemption. This introduces two exemptions that will not require a Special Flight Operations Certificate (SFOC). These are for very small UAVs (under 2 kg) and small UAVs (between 2 kg and 25 kg).

Unmanned Experts Partners with Gold Seal to Provide FAA Ground School

As we speculate about what the FAA will propose for sUAS regulations, it’s a pretty good bet that some type of operator certification or license will be required. That implies there will be some training for pilots. Flight training provider Gold Seal has teamed up with Unmanned Experts to adapt the manned aircraft training for UAS. The UAV Ground School PPL Course is now available for purchase.

Fraunhofer developing flying inventory robots to keep tabs on stock

A project of the Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics would have autonomous drones perform warehouse operations like stock taking and record keeping. Under the InventAIRy Project, warehouses wouldn’t have to shut down while employees took a physical inventory.

In a conventional RFID inventory tracking system, the chips are in the goods which are recorded as they pass by the antennas. In this system, the chips remain stationary, but the antennas move – on a flying robot.

Domestic Drone Casualties

The writer is concerned that the model airplane hobby is getting swept into the whole UAS regulations process, and this isn’t good for R/C and it isn’t good for full sized aviation either.

Video of the Week

DJI Phantom 2 Epic (Domtoren Utrecht)

Listener Frank sends us this beautiful video of a drone flying in the mist.

Feedback

Listener Andy offers three points concerning the US National Park ban on UAVs:

  1. As a hiker, scrambler, and a lover of peace, quiet, and solitude… I do not want some bozo flying these things around me or my family while I am trying to enjoy mother nature.  The reason I am there in the first place is to get some respite from some of the bozos in my everyday life.
  2. As a photographer/videographer, and lover of all things that fly (except mosquitoes  – the bug, not the plane),  I also love getting that unique viewpoint that only a drone/UAV can provide.
  3. But… Point 2 cannot be at the expense of safety or annoying someone who relates to Point 1. 

Andy describes how most National Parks are large, with visitors tending to concentrate in a few areas, leaving many isolated locations away from the crowds. There is plenty of space to fly to get unique aerial footage without compromising safety, space, and solitude.

With that, Andy recommends that hobby drone/sUAV flight should be permitted in the National Parks with the following guidelines…

  • No flying at High Density Area Lookouts/Features or Ecologically sensitive locations (e.g. Mt. Rushmore/Yosemite ValleyOld Faithful Geyser Basin). This can be defined/zoned and given to the pilot when they obtain a permit. 
  • Charge a permit fee – make it reasonable ($10 a day, $20 a week). The permit process would force the “pilot” to get current information on where flying is or is not permitted.
  • Operator must be an AMA member or certificated pilot. This would ensure at least some training/knowledge/exposure to things that fly as compared to the standard individual.
  • As part of the conditions of the permit: common courtesy. If there are any other visitors in the vicinity that flying disrupts or once an objection is raised, the operator must quit.  (Offering the other guests a dronie may help promote positive responses.)
  • General AC 91-57 adherence (400 feet, LOS, etc.).
  • No Wildlife harassment (set a distance restriction.)

Mount Rushmore

In his visits to the Badlands, Custer State Park, and Mt Rushmore, Andy noticed helicopter operations present. These, he says, are noisier than typical multicopters.