[Peetwo]

More singing from same drone sheet -  

Via the other Aunty:

Drone instructor welcomes CASA crackdown and social media trawling to prosecute illegal flying

ABC Illawarra
By Justin Huntsdale

Updated Fri at 11:43amFri 14 Jul 2017, 11:43am


Photo: Braidwood drone instructor Anthony Hoy flys a drone at Flagstaff Hill in Wollongong. (Supplied: Anthony Hoy)

A Civil Aviation Safety Authority-certified drone operator has welcomed a crackdown on illegal drone use, saying beginners do not realise the remote aircraft are capable of bringing down commercial aircraft.

Braidwood drone instructor Anthony Hoy has watched with alarm as drones have become more affordable, widely stocked, and increasingly commonplace in the sky.

"There's a proliferation of the machines at low cost, and I found someone who had purchased one for $200 this week," he said.

The problem is, not everybody knows how to use them safely, or in line with Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) laws.

This week, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau launched an investigation into a suspected collision between a drone and an aircraft in Adelaide.

Three people were also fined a total of more than $3,000 for illegal drone use earlier this year.

Incriminating social media

CASA has taken to trawling sites such as YouTube to source illegal footage.

"The mistake people are making is that the regulator is watching where people are posting footage and they're being prosecuted off their posting — I think that's an encouraging development," Mr Hoy said.

In recent times, the recreational use of smaller drones under two kilograms had been deregulated by CASA.

The rules surrounding their use now are:

• No night flying or flying through cloud or fog
  
• Flying only within line of sight
  
• No flying closer than 30 metres to people or over populous areas such as beaches, parks or sports ovals
  
• No flying above 120 metres from the ground
  
• No flying within 5.5 kilometres of an airfield
  

Photo: An aerial view of Flagstaff Hill lighthouse captured by drone. (Supplied: Anthony Hoy)

Drones can bring down aircraft

While a small plastic quadcopter may seem harmless, Anthony Hoy said they were capable of causing serious damage to people and aircraft.

"These machines at high impact have the capability to bring a commercial airline down if it was sucked into an engine or cracked a windscreen of the plane," he said.

"They move quite quickly and they're a solid object."

Mr Hoy said people most commonly disregarded the rules about flying near people.
Also, with higher powered drones boasting longer battery life, people were also flying their drone significant distances away from themselves.

"In recent times there's been a well-known brand that's $1,600 and capable of flying to 1,000 feet (300 metres), which is against the CASA guidelines," Mr Hoy said.

"It also has a range of four to five kilometres, so you can fly off the aerial imagery well beyond visual line of sight, which is also a breach of the law."

He said the battery life of 20 minutes was far longer than most of his commercial flights, which usually lasted about seven minutes.

Photo: Anthony Hoy advises new drone users to hook up with a club to improve their flying skills. (Supplied: Anthony Hoy)

How to effectively and safely use a drone

Drones have revolutionised photography and videography, but Anthony Hoy said people usually failed when they started using them.

"It might seem like an insignificant amount of money, but 90 per cent of these machines end up in pieces and packages in cupboards after the first fight," he said.

He recommended people connect with a professional instructor or a hobby club when they started using a drone for the first time.

"My advice is to affiliate yourself with a model aircraft club where you have the mentorship of experienced operators who can instruct on the regulatory side of things and the correct way to incrementally improve your piloting skills."

CASA also provides an app called Can I Fly There, which can be a helpful aid.

+ Senate Estimates - Some drone AQON: 117-126 CASA PDF 51KB*

 

Senator Rice, Janet asked:

Senator RICE: Can you take this on notice? I assume there have been some comparisons in other jurisdictions around the world on what the relative impact of drone strikes versus bird strikes would be. Have you analysedthat data yourself?

Mr Carmody: We continue to look at material all the time on those sorts of matte
rs, but, as I said—

Senator RICE: Could you take it on notice to provide for the committee some of your rationale about the difference between bird strikes and drone strikes, and your basis for deciding that drone strikes are, it sounds like, no more of an issue than bird strikes?

Mr Carmody: I would be happy to. I think that the need to know more about the issue is the point we are endeavouring to make. We have a lot of bird strikes and a lot of animal strikes.

CHAIR: There are a hell of a lot more birds than drones out there at the moment.

Senator RICE: But regarding the issue of what impacts a drone strike would have—particularly the recreational drones; the under two-kilogram drones that are being used for recreational purposes that we know are flying where they should not be in controlled airspace, out of sight and far higher than they are meant to—

Mr Carmody: We can certainly take it on notice.

Answer:
The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) has reviewed a number of preliminary international studies and research papers that show the impact of drone strikes on aircraft are similar in consequence and severity to those of bird strikes in a similar weight category. In the absence of sufficient data to determine the true severity of a
drone strike, with only five confirmed drone strikes with aircraft recorded worldwide since 1997, the closest comparison on potential effects of a drone strike on aircraft is a bird strike. - Does that qualify as yet another 'UP YOURS' from Carmody to the RRAT committee Chairs?  

CASA continues to monitor international studies, reviews and tests in this area.

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Senator RICE: If you provide the comparison to the committee, that would be very useful for us. Another bit of information that I would like to know is: you have been talking about your communications program to inform recreational users—how much assessment and what knowledge do you have about the level of knowledge amongst those recreational users of what the rules are and whether they can play with them?

Mr Carmody: We are communicating constantly—

Senator RICE: That is not my question. My question was: how much knowledge in the community is there?

Mr Carmody: I would prefer to take it on notice. I think that I can probably find the answer for you.

Senator RICE: Have you done any analysis of the level of understanding amongst recreational drone users of what the rules are?

Mr Carmody: I am not aware, so I will take it on notice.
…
CHAIR: I am familiar with when it was. You referenced that. You would, no doubt, have information about who you consulted and what the breadth of the consultation was. Could you take that on notice and provide us with who you consulted and if there are any documents where they made a submission to you, you exchanged or a file note—could you also produce that for us?

Mr Carmody: I am happy to. We have a pretty standardised process for consultation. We are very happy to take it on notice.

Answer:
CASA uses its social media channels to determine the communication reach of its safety messages. So far this year, CASA has reached over 1.4 million people through 32 drone safety related posts on Facebook. CASA also provides safety advice and delivers safety education and training through its Aviation Safety Advisors throughout Australia, which includes information on drones.

CASA released a new smartphone app ‘Can I fly there?’ in May 2017 which saw over 20,000 downloads after its first week of launch. The app provides the rules around where you can and cannot fly your drone, presented in an easy-to-use graphic format and using non-aviation language.

CASA also received 90 responses to its Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) for the CASR Part 101 amendments in 2014, which was open to comment from industry and the general public.

Consultation was also undertaken through CASA’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Standards sub-Committee, which currently has 75 member organisations.

CASA expects to publish a Summary of Responses to the NPRM within the next three months, which includes the comments, the respondent’s name/organisation and CASA’s response to all the NPRM responses.   Huh - err why can't they publish that now? Shirley it is just a matter of copying and pasting to a summary file? Hell I'll do it for them if they can't find a minion with a spare 15 minutes - FDS!

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Mr Walker: Correct. We look at how they gain their information. It would be quite simplistic to say that we would take out some advertising, et cetera, which we do in drone publications and, obviously, IT magazines. But where we have been targeting is very much in the social media space. An example is our Facebook site— CASA now has a Facebook site. We started that a couple of years ago; we have seen an exponential growth in the number of people looking at that site. We now have 30,000 followers, and the vast majority of those and a vast amount of the traffic we are seeing is around drones and people wanting to know more information around drones. We have used social media specifically—including Twitter—around targeting the mums and the dads and the 13 year-old kids. And then the next area we have looked at is very much, I suppose, the hobbyist and enthusiast who is not necessarily interested in buying a commercial off-the-shelf drone; they actually buy their components via the internet and they build their own. That has been another key target area.

Senator RICE: What has been the cost of your communications campaign so far?

Mr Walker: In terms of total spend, I would have to take that on notice. In terms of social media, we manage that in-house—that is, the staff, relying on the expertise we have with our own subject-matter experts, and the content is all generated and delivered in-house as part of our normal communications packages.

Answer:
Since the establishment of CASA’s ongoing drone campaign in late 2013, through to June 2017, CASA has spent approximately $177,600 on production and distribution of leaflets, other advertising and associated costs, and on production of the drone app. Social media campaigns are delivered from in-house resources. There's the answer to speeding up the processing of the original Part 101 NPRM stakeholder response summary - or like I said just send them to me and I'll do it for them (for a small fee of course - ).  

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QON 120

..Senator RICE: How many people would you have reached at that show, for example?

Mr Walker: Over the three days, I would have to take it on notice to give you precise numbers; obviously, it tends to be a little bit anecdotal. I know I had three staff on the stand and they were literally hammered for the three days.

Answer:
Over the trade days (Tuesday-Thursday) at the 2017 Avalon Airshow, and the three days (Friday-Sunday) of the inaugural Avalon Air Show Drone Zone, CASA reached an estimated 6,000 people.

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Senator RICE: Will that be targeted at the group that we are concerned about, the recreational drone users?

Mr Walker: Yes, this would be targeted at the general public—targeted at, I suppose, mums and dads and kids—to try and understand what their level of awareness is and, based on that, what our level of effectiveness has been in delivering the communication packages that we have.

Senator RICE: So you are hoping to have determined the program by the end of the year or be out in the field by the end of the year?

Mr Walker: I would like to think we will be out in the field by the end of the year in a position to have some data on the back end of that early in the New Year.

Senator RICE: If you could provide on notice some details of what you have planned in that field, that would be appreciated.

Mr Walker: Certainly, happy to.

Answer:
CASA will be undertaking its biennial stakeholder engagement survey in November 2017 that will include the topic of drones and the understanding of CASA’s role. That's a QON dodge if I have ever seen one. WTD does the biennial stakeholder survey have to do with testing the effectiveness of the CASA drone awareness and education program?

MTF...P2