The State of Drone Regulations: A Look at the Last Year

In anticipation of our webinar subsequent Tuesday with Real Tour Vision entitled The State of Drone Regulations & Real Estate Marketing in 2017 we’re publishing a brief collection of articles that can look at how far we’ve are available the drone trade over the final 12 months, and the place we’re going subsequent.

Today’s put up will look again at all the things that’s occurred in the world of drone laws over the final 12 months, and the subsequent put up, which is able to come out on Monday, will look ahead at all we are able to hope to see in the subsequent 12 months and past.

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Finally, we plan to publish an article after the webinar to handle questions that come up throughout the presentation, and that can look at real-life situations that business pilots in actual property and different sectors face each day.

Sign up for the free webinar now: The State of Drone Regulations & Real Estate Marketing in 2017.

The Last Year in Drone Regulations

The final 12 months has been nothing brief of unbelievable for the drone trade.

In the U.S. we noticed the rollout of the FAA’s Part 107 necessities, a improvement which has led to enormous progress in the quantity of licensed business pilots, and which (fortunately) changed the antiquated 333 Exemption course of.

We’ve seen the FAA rising its partnerships with personal industries by means of the Pathfinder Program and the LAANC to conduct UAV-focused analysis, with the final objective of opening up the regulatory scene for sorts of flying which can be at the moment prohibited (like Beyond Visual Line Of Sight flights, flying over folks, and flying at evening), in addition to streamlining airspace authorization requests and waiver submissions.

Internationally we’ve seen enormous strides made in drone legal guidelines, with Denmark and New Zealand saying everlasting BVLOS permissions for personal firms and dozens of international locations launching or beefing up their drone laws, with the objective of professionalizing this burgeoning trade.

Let’s take it from the high.

The Launch of the Part 107 Exam

Almost precisely one 12 months in the past, on June 21, 2016, the FAA launched its extremely anticipated guidelines governing the operation of small UAS for business functions. The guidelines went into impact two months later, on August 29.

The guidelines required that business UAV pilots go a check entitled the Aeronautical Knowledge Test for a Remote Pilot Certificate (or the Part 107 examination) in an effort to be licensed to fly commercially.

The June launch was an enormous step ahead for the trade. Commercial pilots not needed to endure the months-long wait and doubtlessly excessive prices beforehand related to pursuing a 333 exemption.

Now, they merely needed to go a check. Talk about streamlined.

Part 107 Stats

In the first 15 days after the Part 107 examination was carried out, 5,124 pilots took the check, and four,503 handed.

Two months later these numbers had nearly doubled, to 9,796 having taken the check, and eight,649 having handed (as of October 14, 2016).

Fast ahead to the current (nicely to March, the most present date we have now knowledge for). As of March 21, 2017 there have been a whopping 37,579 licenses issued by the FAA, and that quantity has certainly grown in the final three months.

Using the March quantity, we all know that there have been about 1,565 pilots passing the check each week because it went stay, or about 223 pilots passing each single day. That’s rather a lot of drone pilots.

We additionally know that there are about 800,000 hobbyists who’ve registered with the FAA as of March 27, 2017, which is somewhat beneath double the quantity we noticed at this time final 12 months, when there have been about 460,000 drone house owners registered. (To make clear, 800,000 is the whole of all registered drone house owners, not new house owners since June, 2016.)

FAA Partnerships—the Pathfinder Program and LAANC

In the final 12 months, the FAA’s Pathfinder Program launched its Drone Detection Initiative (truly it was launched in May of 2016, however we determine it’s shut sufficient!).

This initiative is a partnership between the FAA and Gryphon Sensors, Liteye Systems Inc. and Sensofusion with the objective of aggressively pursuing know-how and strategic planning round how you can establish and management rogue drones, whether or not they be by chance or deliberately current in managed airspace.

Since then, Gryphon Sensors launched their Mobile Skylight Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) system at AUVSI XPONENTIAL, a system for detecting and managing drones that can assist maintain our skies safer. Many checks and much of analysis have been completed to construct UTMs over the final 12 months, together with work being completed by NASA, and we all know that the consequence of all this work shall be safer skies, and a extra organized system for flying drones commercially.

In addition to the Pathfinder Program, the FAA not too long ago launched the Low Altitude Authorization and Notification Capability (LAANC) system, a partnership with personal firms that has as one of its main objectives the automation of granting waivers and permits to business drone operators in search of to fly in managed airspace.

Now that’s an thrilling concept. Check out how the LAANC is definitely pursuing this objective in the part beneath.

Improvements in the Airspace Authorization Request Process

The FAA not too long ago launched the first spherical of UAS Facility Maps, which present business pilots the data used to find out whether or not an airspace authorization request will get accredited or denied.

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The launch of these maps is a large step ahead for the airspace authorization course of, and the first (and we should always add a fast) win from the LAANC in relation to shifting towards a totally automated system for granting waivers, permits, and authorization.

By utilizing these maps, pilots can instantly see if the space the place they wish to fly shall be granted authorization. The guesswork is eliminated, including extra certainty not simply to the authorization course of, however to the trade as a complete. This is a large step ahead for the trade, and one to applaud as we glance again at the final 12 months.

Now all we’d like is a course of to streamline making use of for waivers to fly over folks and different sorts of flights prohibited by Part 107 . . .

International Regulations

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When it involves worldwide drone laws there have been so many adjustments and updates, and a lot constructive progress, that we might dedicate a collection simply to discussing them.

For now, we’d counsel testing our in-depth BVLOS article, which highlights new BVLOS laws in 13 international locations. (Denmark and New Zealand are at the innovative, as we famous above, however there are lots of different international locations sizzling on their heels in relation to opening up the skies to sorts of flying that had been beforehand prohibited.)

We assume BVLOS waivers are a bellwether for the way progressive a rustic is in relation to drone laws, and the way organized and intentional they’re about supporting the progress of the trade. Of course, they’re additionally an indicator of the nation’s measurement—for a rustic the measurement of Denmark, finding out laws is only a totally different animal than it’s for a rustic the measurement of the U.S. or Canada.

What a tremendous 12 months it’s been for drone laws. Don’t overlook to examine in on Monday to examine the place we’re headed subsequent.

Also—don’t overlook to enroll in our webinar subsequent Tuesday with Real Tour Vision: The State of Drone Regulations & Real Estate Marketing in 2017.