FAA Says Commercial Drone Operations Are Illegal… Public Says So What?
March 6, 2014 update: On March 6, 2014 Federal Judge Patrick Geraghty ruled against the FAA in its case against Rapheal Pirker, opening up commercial use of drones in the U.S.
March 3, 2014 update: On February 26, 2014, the FAA published “Busting Myths about the FAA and Unmanned Aircraft” in an effort to clarify its position on commercial use of drones in the U.S.
Forgive me for circling back on the the topic of drone use for commercial mapping in the U.S., but I’m drawn to it like a bee to honey. Perhaps it’s because I used to fly airplanes, or because drone technology encompasses a lot of the technology I’m involved with: GNSS, inertial navigation, GIS, imagery. Be that as it may, the most intriguing aspect of this issue in the U.S. is that seemingly law-abiding citizens are knowingly (or unknowningly) disregarding the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) firm stance that no commercial drone operations are allowed.
According to the FAA, it doesn’t matter if the drone flies under 400 feet. It doesn’t matter if an operator only flies the drone above his/her own property. It doesn’t matter if the drone operator doesn’t charge for the service. If its business-related (such as mapping your fields), it’s illegal, according to the FAA.
But, who cares?
Late last year, Fox News published a story about a farmer in Idaho who uses a drone he built to monitor activities on his farm. According to the report, he’s not waiting around for the FAA “to work out rules for drones.” Countless U.S. start-up companies are promoting their mapping drones by either selling drones (MarcusUAV, Honeycomb, VoltAerial Robotics, Precision Drone, etc.) or selling services to process data collected by drones (such as DroneMapper).
Last week, online magazine Politico published an article appropriately titled “FAA Risks Losing the Drone War.” The article summarizes that as much as the FAA wants to tell you it’s illegal to fly drones commercially, people are doing it anyway. They aren’t sneaking around trying to hide it! High-profile people have openly used drones without regard to the FAA’s opinion. Martin Scorsese reportedly hired a drone service company to shoot one of the scenes in the 2013 movie “The Wolf of Wall Street.”
Last year, NBC News published an article entitled “Damn the regulations! Drones plying US skies without waiting for FAA rules.” In the article, they quote an anonymous operator.
“Honestly?” said one commercial operator, who requested anonymity to protect his business. “My hope is that I’m far afield enough and small enough potatoes to the FAA that I can fly under the radar on this one.”
I think that’s the most honest statement I’ve read so far, and that’s probably the attitude of nearly every operator who is flying drones commercially in the U.S., even as they attempt to justify how they are legally (or illegally) dancing around the FAA rules.
The FAA has to take the majority of the blame for letting this happen. Perhaps it’s intentional? A “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy? There seem to have been very few enforcement actions taken by the FAA. In November 2013, I requested a list of enforcement actions from the FAA regarding UAVs. Despite giving me delivery dates, nothing has arrived and I’m told I won’t likely see anything from the agency. In an article published by BusinessWeek last week entitled “The FAA Finds Commercial Drone Flights Hard to Police,” BusinessWeek reports that the FAA informed the magazine that it took action “17 times in 13 months ending July.” Furthermore, the article quotes a former FAA employee involved with drones as saying “The reality is, there is no way to patrol it.”
March 3, 2014 Update: On February 26, 2014, the FAA published “Busting Myths about the FAA and Unmanned Aircraft”.
Thanks, and see you next time.
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About the Author: Eric Gakstatter
Eric Gakstatter has been involved in the GPS/GNSS industry for more than 20 years. For 10 years, he held several product management positions in the GPS/GNSS industry, managing the development of several medium- and high-precision GNSS products along with associated data-collection and post-processing software. Since 2000, he's been a power user of GPS/GNSS technology as well as consulted with capital management companies; federal, state and local government agencies; and private companies on the application and/or development of GPS technology. Since 2006, he's been a contributor to GPS World magazine, serving as editor of the monthly Survey Scene newsletter until 2015, and as editor of Geospatial Solutions monthly newsletter for GPS World's sister site Geospatial Solutions, which focuses on GIS and geospatial technologies.
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This will be a topic when lawsuits come about for damage, injury, noise complaints, or invasion of privacy. In many cases the commercial operators are taking on liability by operating illegally even if the FAA don’t prosecute.
doesn’t prosecute.
This will be a topic when lawsuits come about for damage, injury, noise complaints, or invasion of privacy. In many cases the commercial operators are taking on liability by operating illegally even if the FAA don’t prosecute.
doesn’t prosecute.
I can’t believe a country as advanced as America has not embraced this technology. The FAA should put in place laws to protect commercial airliner space– but to stop farmers from mapping their fields and other applications such as mining and stockpile volumes is not a good image for the rest of the world. I note that the government is happy for American companies to sell the drones in other countries and rake in the taxes. As an application there is some wonderful footage of the Bells beach surfing classic covered last year with drones above the surfers.
In Australia we are embracing this advancement-even though the operators have to obtain a pilots licence. Funny thing just 500 meters from my home, a group of amateurs fly their “drones” in a park every weekend. I also have just come back from rural Victoria where I have seen 1.5 meter gliders used for recreation. Alsoin my GIS industry a few major mining companies have already invested in this technology. Note MAPTEK annnouncement last week
I can’t believe a country as advanced as America has not embraced this technology. The FAA should put in place laws to protect commercial airliner space– but to stop farmers from mapping their fields and other applications such as mining and stockpile volumes is not a good image for the rest of the world. I note that the government is happy for American companies to sell the drones in other countries and rake in the taxes. As an application there is some wonderful footage of the Bells beach surfing classic covered last year with drones above the surfers.
In Australia we are embracing this advancement-even though the operators have to obtain a pilots licence. Funny thing just 500 meters from my home, a group of amateurs fly their “drones” in a park every weekend. I also have just come back from rural Victoria where I have seen 1.5 meter gliders used for recreation. Alsoin my GIS industry a few major mining companies have already invested in this technology. Note MAPTEK annnouncement last week
Can someone explain the difference between “drone” and an R/C aircraft? Those have had electronic stabilization for a very long time, esp R/C helos. The jump from there to flight dynamics augmentation isn’t big, and adding full authority digital flight controls is not that big given the evolution in IMU technology. Using on board DFCs to keep a craft within a prescribed volume is much more accurate than eyeballs from the ground.
I do believe they need to make a big distinction between Remotely Piloted Vehicles with on board augmentation and full-blown Autonomous Vehicles which can conduct a mission with little or no human assistance. if the craft is an RPV with attentive operator and operated within the framework of classic R/C with the addition of augmentation to improve situational awareness, I don’t see such a huge problem.
anyone else old enough to remember the Citizen Band Radio fiasco? The FCC completely lost control of things when they tried to “control” it in its classic bureaucratic style. The managed to get back some semblance of sanity by simply realizing that they needed to make getting a license the easy case. Radios came with a postcard the the owner filled out very simply like the warrantee card and mailed it off. The FCC got many radios registered and could go after the egregious a users. then they declared victory!
The difference, by the FAA’s definition, is not defined by technology, but rather by usage. You can use a drone or R/C UAV aircraft for personal use as a hobby as long as you stay below 400 feet AGL. See the description of hobby usage rules here:
http://rgl.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgAdvisoryCircular.nsf/0/1acfc3f689769a56862569e70077c9cc/$FILE/ATTBJMAC/ac91-57.pdf
Even if it’s the exact same UAV, the FAA prohibits you from using it for business (commercial) purposes. A FAA FAQ list on UAVs can be viewed here:
http://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/uas/uas_faq/
To demonstrate just how silly the “difference” is, I asked the FAA the following question: A customer brings a recently-purchased RC airplane back to my hobby shop, claiming that something is wrong with the way it flies. Am I, as the distributor of this product, allowed to fly the product with the customer in order to review the problem and determine the best course of action?
The answer I received was (in summary) that doing so would violate the ban on flying drones for commercial purposes. They suggested that I should contact a local RC flight hobby club and ask them to fly the model (without compensation) instead.
Can you imagine being the customer in this scenario? “Sorry, I can’t do anything about your problem until my buddy from the model plane club comes over to take your toy out for a spin.”
Can someone explain the difference between “drone” and an R/C aircraft? Those have had electronic stabilization for a very long time, esp R/C helos. The jump from there to flight dynamics augmentation isn’t big, and adding full authority digital flight controls is not that big given the evolution in IMU technology. Using on board DFCs to keep a craft within a prescribed volume is much more accurate than eyeballs from the ground.
I do believe they need to make a big distinction between Remotely Piloted Vehicles with on board augmentation and full-blown Autonomous Vehicles which can conduct a mission with little or no human assistance. if the craft is an RPV with attentive operator and operated within the framework of classic R/C with the addition of augmentation to improve situational awareness, I don’t see such a huge problem.
anyone else old enough to remember the Citizen Band Radio fiasco? The FCC completely lost control of things when they tried to “control” it in its classic bureaucratic style. The managed to get back some semblance of sanity by simply realizing that they needed to make getting a license the easy case. Radios came with a postcard the the owner filled out very simply like the warrantee card and mailed it off. The FCC got many radios registered and could go after the egregious a users. then they declared victory!
The difference, by the FAA’s definition, is not defined by technology, but rather by usage. You can use a drone or R/C UAV aircraft for personal use as a hobby as long as you stay below 400 feet AGL. See the description of hobby usage rules here:
http://rgl.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgAdvisoryCircular.nsf/0/1acfc3f689769a56862569e70077c9cc/$FILE/ATTBJMAC/ac91-57.pdf
Even if it’s the exact same UAV, the FAA prohibits you from using it for business (commercial) purposes. A FAA FAQ list on UAVs can be viewed here:
http://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/uas/uas_faq/
To demonstrate just how silly the “difference” is, I asked the FAA the following question: A customer brings a recently-purchased RC airplane back to my hobby shop, claiming that something is wrong with the way it flies. Am I, as the distributor of this product, allowed to fly the product with the customer in order to review the problem and determine the best course of action?
The answer I received was (in summary) that doing so would violate the ban on flying drones for commercial purposes. They suggested that I should contact a local RC flight hobby club and ask them to fly the model (without compensation) instead.
Can you imagine being the customer in this scenario? “Sorry, I can’t do anything about your problem until my buddy from the model plane club comes over to take your toy out for a spin.”
Please remove the image from this article that you obtained without permission from the authors (Dronemapper or Falcon UAV).
I removed it. Please note that it is posted in a public gallery without copyright or credit instructions, therefore assumed it’s on a page designed to share images of products and services.
Please remove the image from this article that you obtained without permission from the authors (Dronemapper or Falcon UAV).
I removed it. Please note that it is posted in a public gallery without copyright or credit instructions, therefore assumed it’s on a page designed to share images of products and services.
The FAA sets hefty fines when someone aims a green laser at an aircraft and people get caught. Homeland security regulates model rocketry. Regulation and enforcement isn’t going away because everyone does it.
When a plane is brought down by a “hobby” drone things will change quickly. There’s enough irresponsible people out there with a thousand dollars to spend on a drone I expect it will be sooner than later.
Even on a farm in Idaho a small drone can hit an crop duster or small into a cell phone tower.
Someone could hit someone else with a car, a motorbike or a bicycle… cars can crash into each other or against houses!
They should be banned also!!!
Moron!!!
Regulated: yes. Banned: no.
The FAA sets hefty fines when someone aims a green laser at an aircraft and people get caught. Homeland security regulates model rocketry. Regulation and enforcement isn’t going away because everyone does it.
When a plane is brought down by a “hobby” drone things will change quickly. There’s enough irresponsible people out there with a thousand dollars to spend on a drone I expect it will be sooner than later.
Even on a farm in Idaho a small drone can hit an crop duster or small into a cell phone tower.
Someone could hit someone else with a car, a motorbike or a bicycle… cars can crash into each other or against houses!
They should be banned also!!!
Moron!!!
Regulated: yes. Banned: no.
I would like to clarify that the FAA is very careful NOT to say that commercial drone use is “illegal.” Review the FAA’s statements again and you will see the words “prohibited,” “not allowed,” “banned” … but NEVER “illegal.” The word “illegal” would mean that a law or regulation prohibits it; no such law or regulation exists. The FAA knows this and thus chooses its words carefully.
Interesting point. I will pay closer attention to this, and query the FAA.
I would like to clarify that the FAA is very careful NOT to say that commercial drone use is “illegal.” Review the FAA’s statements again and you will see the words “prohibited,” “not allowed,” “banned” … but NEVER “illegal.” The word “illegal” would mean that a law or regulation prohibits it; no such law or regulation exists. The FAA knows this and thus chooses its words carefully.
Interesting point. I will pay closer attention to this, and query the FAA.
Why is there all this recent talk about drones ? They are nothing new.
The Green Hornet used one on TV back in the 1960’s.
Because drones became affordable, ready to use out of the box and can carry pay load over a couple of miles. So for under 1000,- any individual is now able to use drones for impacting historie, for the good as well for the bad.
Why is there all this recent talk about drones ? They are nothing new.
The Green Hornet used one on TV back in the 1960’s.
Because drones became affordable, ready to use out of the box and can carry pay load over a couple of miles. So for under 1000,- any individual is now able to use drones for impacting historie, for the good as well for the bad.
Eventually it all will come down to liability: No insurance or coverage? Ignoring regulations would be stupido or criminal. S effect: get cought at an accident and you’ll be bank rupt.
Eventually it all will come down to liability: No insurance or coverage? Ignoring regulations would be stupido or criminal. S effect: get cought at an accident and you’ll be bank rupt.
Hi Eric,
I have a question for you that I would like to take off-site. Can you email me, please? Thanks!
Hi Eric,
I have a question for you that I would like to take off-site. Can you email me, please? Thanks!