Page 16 - Volume 20 No. 6

DL rones: An Opportuni
et’s get this out right up front. fun and exciting area of business, but too worried, let’s think about how a IamapilotandIownadrone. for many of my customers and pilot drone can work for us. As pilots and
With all the talk about drones mixing with aircraft, I thought it might be good to start this article by clarifying what a “drone” is. When I’m talking about drones, I am talking about sUAV or small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. The FAA likes to use the term, sUAS or small Unmanned Aerial Systems. Sometimes they are called RPV, Remotely Piloted Vehicles. But, in the end, most people just call them drones.
I’m not new at this; I’ve been a modeler since I was a kid flying remote-controlled aircraft and helicopters, and a licensed pilot since I was in high school. And, for those that don’t know me, that’s 1975. I have been in the aircraft and aviation insurance business since 1985. It seems to be that there are two sides to this issue of drones and I just want you to know which side I am coming from, which happens to be both.
Getting into drones was an easy transition for me, particularly since many of the aviation insurance underwriters have been insuring drones for years. I’ve found it to be a
friends it’s something substantially different.
The drone industry is growing exponentially and can potentially be good for aviation. Many pilots see drones as a danger, because this new rapidly-growing industry can open the doors to many people getting into the airspace without experience or training. But it can also offer opportunities for drone pilots to move into other areas of aviation. In reality, I think it’s a chance to promote aviation.
A Big Opportunity
Okay, what’s the big deal about drones? Well, the FAA estimated that over a million drones were sold just at Christmas. That’s a lot of flying machines. I was at a drone convention last September and it was reported that one major manufacturer was selling 15,000 drones a day, worldwide. Think of your cell phone and how fast the smart phone market took off.
It’s a numbers game. With that many drones flying around, any report of a near-miss will add to the pilot’s concerns. But, before we get
aircraft owners, thousands of people flying drones have made the public more aware of the world of aviation. Sure, it’s just a “model”, but now people that never got involved with aircraft are thinking about drones as a hobby or business. In the model aircraft world, many of the model aircraft pilots are full-size aircraft pilots too. I went from models to full size, as did many other people I know. Why can’t this new drone trend be the same?
It is important to note that, in order to operate a drone as “for hire” or “commercial” use, the drone needs to be registered with the FAA, have a 333 Exemption, obtain a Certificate of Authorization (COA), and be flown by a licensed pilot. In the legal sense, the commercial operators should already know the “rules of the air”, compared to the hobbyists. But, with the huge number of drone operators, I would guess that many do not meet those minimums.
If that’s the case, those inexperienced pilots will need to have some sort of training to get them up to speed with the rest of the aviation community. Sure, there are drone-
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