The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is currently reviewing the report and recommendations of the Micro Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Aviation Rulemaking Committee. The agency had tasked the group to develop recommendations for performance-based regulations that would let certain unmanned aircraft operate over people not directly involved in the flight of the aircraft.
The rulemaking committee, which began meeting March 8, worked under a tight deadline of April 1 to deliver its report. The task force included a diverse set of aviation stakeholders, including UAS manufacturers, UAS operators, consensus standards organizations, researchers and academics.
“We commend the committee members for their sincere dedication and for producing a comprehensive report in such a short time,” said FAA Administrator Michael Huerta. “This type of collaborative government and industry partnership is exactly what is needed to keep pace with this rapidly changing industry and will serve as a model for future rulemaking advisory tasks.”
The ARC’s consensus report recommends establishing four small UAS categories, defined primarily by risk of injury to people below the flight path. For each category, the group recommends assigning a potential risk linked to either weight or impact energy. The report also addresses operational restrictions and standards to minimize the risks associated with each category.
The FAA will use the information in the report to develop a flexible, performance-based proposed rule. The public will have an opportunity to comment on the proposal based on the ARC’s recommendations.
You can download a copy of the report here.
Source: Press Release
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FYI,
LB
Thanks Larry – fixed now…
Looks like the ARC has no understanding of how the RC modeling hobby works.
The report recommendations for requirements of “the manufacturer” of the UAS are totally impractical. I’d estimate that in at least 80% of the cases “the manufacturer” is the RC modeler themselves. Visit any AMA or private RC flying field and that becomes obvious.
That’s what RC modeling is all about – building your own finished model aircraft either built from scratch or from a kit of raw components.
In these cases there is no operators manual to comply with, and it’s extremely unlikely that individual hobbyists (which number in the hundreds of thousands) are going to submit paperwork to the FAA which declares each and every model airplane or model helicopter that they have built meets some type of industry consensus performance standards. How would the performance of the model aircraft be validated to meet those standards anyway? Some type of FAA testing center where all past, present and future model aircraft constructed by hobbyists would have to be taken to and tested? Sorry – not going to happen. The costs of doing so would be immense. Who is going to pay for it?
Probably a moot question anyway, since the compliance rate would likely be virtually zero. No hobbyist in their right mind is going to take their carefully constructed RC airplane to an FAA testing center to have it dissected and tested to see if it meets impact energy requirements.
Need to scrap all of this and start over again. Start with a better understanding of what you are trying to regulate.