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Amazon Drones - A good idea

Some may have seen this on the news today.

In the US, and maybe in Europe, possibly as early as 2015 (though unlikely due to technical and logistical immaturities) the FAA might have granted approval for such drones to be allowed access to the necessary airspace. As a consumer it looks great – receving delivery of your book or whatever within 30 minutes – thats assuming some idot hasnt tried to take a pot shot at it enroute somehow.

But as an GA pilot I’d be slightly concerned about sharing OCAS (because surely they wouldnt let these things in CAS would they) with another flying machine to keep an eye out for, even if they were transponder equipped and visible on a TCAS/PCAS.
Even if they were in <500 ft AGL ‘zone’ and in most cases GA is at least >500ft AGL enroute, I can imagine they would be a bit of a nuiscance, and even up against a C152, you wouldn want to hit one doing a PFL or some other low level exercise.

Thoughts?

When I read that a while ago, I instinctively thought about April fools day…

Luckily they will not show up in Germany, as even our armed forces were denied permission to deploy their mega-expensive “Eurohawk” drones within our airspace.

EDDS - Stuttgart

Neither the technology or the regulatory frameworks are viable for this at the moment. I think Amazon are doing it as a bit of viral marketing.

The UK have one of the most forward attitudes towards civilian UAV in the developed world, because they do allow them for commercial use, when suitably licensed etc. But the current UK regulations would prevent this from happening on several counts – you need unaided visual contact, over 7Kg (as this would likely be) you need clearance in CAS, and for commercial use the CAA typically grant permission to operate only within 500m laterally (and 400 feet vertically, but that wouldn’t be an issue with this), not within 150m of a congested area and not within 50m of anything or anyone not under the operator’s control.

The technology just isn’t there either. Autonomous operation from rest to at rest at some remote GPS-defined point is fine, but the descent at the far end would be fraught – a tree in your front garden, a car in your driveway, any kind of overhead cable, not to mention pedestrians, etc. all of those would cause problems for current small UAV, though I suppose with enough cameras and other sensors you could create something that would work. 10 mile range isn’t going to happen with current battery technology; multirotors fly at about 20mph and no way can you get an hour out of current battery technology with a multirotor – more like 20 minutes tops and that’s with perhaps a 1Kg payload (e.g. an SLR with a prime lens).

PiperArcher, you are already sharing the space with them in the UK, albeit with the constraints I mention above. The 400’ rule is to generally keep them out of the way of GA traffic, since technically you shouldn’t be within 500’ of the pilot and if the UAV is no more than 400’ from its pilot you’re all good! There is also a requirement to operate only with permission with an ATZ, so when you’re taking off or landing you should be ok. I suppose that leaves grass strips, but then both pilots should operate see-and-avoid.

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EGTR / London, United Kingdom
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