FAA Administrator Michael Huerta told Candy Crowley on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday that education about Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) safety and regulation enforcement needs to be improved in order to actually keep the airways safe. While those operating RPAs tout their benefits, Huerta noted: “On the other side, you have pilots, commercial pilots, general aviation pilots, who are very concerned that these are difficult to see, they don’t really have a good understanding of how they interact with other aircraft, and bedrock principle of aviation is a principle called see and avoid. The pilots take action to avoid one another. So it’s for that reason that we have a plan for a staged and thoughtful integration of unmanned aircraft where we look at lower risk uses first, and then gradually work to others.” Read the full post here.
Reader Interactions
Share this story
Become a better informed pilot.
Join 110,000 readers each month and get the latest news and entertainment from the world of general aviation direct to your inbox, daily.
It’s all about safety. Who wants to die in an airliner crash because somebody demanded the right to fly toys in their airspace? Keep them below regulated airspace and there won’t be any problems. Unfortunately there are some fools out there who have nearly caused disaster by flying drones thousands of feet AGL. Like it or not, the FAA is the agency tasked with protecting the flying public from idiots like that. Let them do their job.
Ha Ha! More regulations for the radio control “pilots”. Make sure they have a third class medical, ADSB, and an STC for the fuel they are burning, nav lights, etc. etc. etc. (just an excuse to make the FAA bureaucrapcy have to hire more staff and have a bigger budget). Go figure.