The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has had profound effects on Switzerland’s aviation sector and the supervisory activities of its civil aviation regulator, the Federal Office of Civil Aviation (FOCA). One outcome of the same has been a steep reduction in the number of safety risk incident reports and occurrences involving drones in the country.
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Let’s say you had an issue while on a recent drone flight. Maybe you were a mission and a manned aircraft dipped below 400 feet. Maybe the drone had a flyaway. What to do? Well, the FAA is encouraging you to report it, using an anonymous and largely non-punitive system.
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Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has partnered with Northern Territory Airports to install drone safety signage. The signs come as no surprise as the Alice Springs airport, located in the Northern Territory, saw an increase in drone activity during the pandemic.
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The Port of Antwerp, Belgium, has announced it has chosen Unifly to be its UTM technology provider to improve airspace safety. The move will make the Port of Antwerp the first seaport to manage its own airspace.
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Sigh. We’ve seen this before. A video is making the rounds showing a drone damage the winglet of a passenger jet on takeoff. We should clarify: Making the rounds again, because we’ve seen this before. It was a fake the first time… and it’s just as fake now.
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DJI’s new FPV drone combo has some amazing technology baked in. It’s also not inexpensive. So this post is for people who are not experienced pilots.
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The Port of Antwerp, Belgium, has turned to autonomous drones to undertake inspections, surveillance, and monitoring missions. The drones will allow the port to undertake fully independent operations, improve efficiency, lower costs in the long term, and make the port safer.
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The popular B4UFLY airspace awareness tool – used as a mobile app by many US drone operators – is now available via desktop/laptop.
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A pretty cool clip is making the rounds on the internet today. It’s of an eagle plucking a drone from the sky, and then flying away with it.
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We’ve been kind of obsessed with jetpack guy since he was first spotted last summer near Los Angeles International Airport. Now, new information has come to light that suggests it could well be a drone.
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We usually skip over fail videos on YouTube. But when we happened across this one, we thought it offered some lessons for drone pilots. And so we’re going to interrupt our normal drone news programming to offer you a greatest hits package featuring some dreadful pilot errors. Oh yes, and a couple of dogs.
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In what appears to be a first, a drone pilot has pleaded guilty to colliding his drone into a Los Angeles Police Department helicopter. It’s believed to be the first criminal conviction in the United States for unsafe operation of an unmanned aircraft.
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The FAA is hoping a new reminder, along with some graphics, might result in people keeping their drones well clear of stadiums at game-time.
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We’ve had a number of inquiries about whether it will be legal to fly DJI’s new FPV drone (when it’s eventually released). Of course, the same regulations would apply to all FPV drones, not just a DJI product. We knew the answer, but thought it would be good to take a deeper dive.
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We believe rules are there for a reason. And both the Federal Aviation Administration and its Canadian equivalent, Transport Canada, have tried to strike a balance between maintaining safe airspace and letting drone pilots go about their business. But there will always be those who ignore the rules.
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Ahhhh….winter. Those crisp skies, stable air, and particles of freezing moisture. Should you be concerned? Why yes, yes you should be. Just wait till you see what happened to one pilot.
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DJI’s interactive drone rescue map has hit a major milestone, displaying over 500 people rescued with drones. The map, which was introduced earlier in the year, has been an easy way for people and organizations to add their drone-aided rescues.
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CAL Analytics has launched its drone safety platform and detects and avoids services to improve the safety of drone flights. The platform results from a collaborative effort between CAL Analytics, ResilienX, TrueWeather Solutions, Kongsberg Geospatial, Kent State University, and Ohio State University.
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This week is National Drone Safety Awareness Week (NDSAW), and AUVSI has once again sponsored the event. The event runs from November 16-22 with various daily virtual events for you to take part in.
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It may be Friday the 13th, but it’s also National Drone Safety Awareness day in Canada. It’s Canada’s inaugural drone safety day — and comes just before the FAA launches its National Drone Safety Awareness week. Let’s find out more.
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Next week is National Drone Safety Awareness Week! It’s a week full of educational programming focusing on the safe operation of drones. The event is run by a public-private partnership called Know Before You Fly and will collaborate with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
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DJI‘s drone apps have no-fly zones built-in, a safety feature that is great to have right in the DJI app but is it as useful as you might think? Personally, it’s a no from me, the app usually has no-fly zones for major airports but misses out for some smaller airports.
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Ensuring that everything is A-OK prior to taking off for a drone flight is important. But it’s not that easy to remember all the various things that you should really be marking methodically off a checklist. That’s why we recommend using and personalizing a standard pre-flight checklist.
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The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) shared a drone rules reminder on Twitter after what we can only assume caused the message to be sent out, neighbors sharing a drink with each other via a drone in eastern Australia.
