U.S. Secretary of Transportation Elaine L. Chao has announced a new drone integration initiative called BEYOND to tackle the rest of the issues facing drones. The news comes after the Integration Pilot Program (IPP) successfully ended on October 25th.
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FedEx is working with the Department of Transportation (DOT) to test drone technology within an airport environment at the Memphis International Airport. The tests in association with DJI and Asylon will help form future FAA regulations.
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Grab a cup of coffee and watch the video below in which Yahoo Finance interviews U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao about the latest developments in the transportation sector. Of course, drones are discussed as well for a good part of the interview. However, it seems that U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao fails to understand that the FAA’s NPRM for Remote ID kills the consumer drone hobby by severely restricting it and making it more expensive.
The Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) NPRM for Remote ID for drones is exactly the kind of top-down, command and control policy that the Secretary states the U.S. government is not into. The interview took place during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
U.S. Secretary of Transportation, Elaine L. Chao explains in an opinion piece, titled “Prioritizing safety in the drone revolution”, why safe and responsible drone flying is crucial to the future of the drone industry.
In a statement sent to DroneDJ earlier today, the U.S. Secretary of Transportation Elaine L. Chao welcomes Steve Dickson as Federal Aviation Administration Administrator. She points to his ‘decades of experience in the airline industry overseeing flight operations, and service to our country as a United States Air Force officer.’
Never mind the partial shut down of the U.S. Government. Today in a speech in Washington, the Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao said that the U.S. Department of Transportation would for the first time allow routine flights over people and flights at night without waivers as long as the drone operators take the appropriate safety precautions. This is a groundbreaking announcement that opens up the possibility of deliveries by drone and a range of other commercial drone applications.
Yesterday the U.S. Department of Transportation announced the 10 pilot programmes that have been approved under President Trump’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Pilot Program (UAS IPP) in an effort to bring the country up to speed when it comes to drone experimentation. Yesterday we published the list of awardees and today we are reporting on the companies that made the list such as Airbus, Alphabet (Google), Apple, AT&T, Microsoft, FedEx, Uber, and others. As well as the ones that did not make the list, most notably Amazon and DJI.
Today, Secretary, Elaine L. Chao of the Department of Transportation announced the 10 applications that have been selected to start as part of the UAS Integration Pilot Program, that was introduced by President Trump late last year. Reportedly 200 businesses submitted a total of 149 applications for the program. Initially, only five applications were going to be selected as part of the UAS IPP, but because of the strong interest from states, local governments, tribes, and businesses around the country that number was increased to 10. Furthermore, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has said that the agency will work with the other applicants to “operationalize their proposed projects.”
Yesterday, President Trump gave the ‘green light’ to US cities and states to work together with tech companies to accelerate and increase the number of drone tests across the United States. The “Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Pilot” program as it is called, was announced in a new memorandum released by the White House on Wednesday.
Trump signed the memorandum directing, Elaine Chao, Secretary of Transportation to create a pilot program that allows local, state and tribal governments to apply to establish test areas, possibly as large as an entire state, where extensive drone testing can take place. As part of this program, at least five trial programs are expected to be started within the next three years. All trials will be subject to FAA approval.
