Drones

The FAA plans to begin publishing airport grid maps on April 27. The new maps break an airport down into one-mile squares that each contain the maximum altitude a drone may expect to be safely flown at when near an airport. Altitudes that exceed those depicted on the maps will require additional safety analysis and […]

Amazon’s Prime Air delivery system moved ever nearer to reality in the United States last week when one of the company’s drones delivered a small box of sunscreen bottles to a pre-established meeting site at an Amazon-hosted conference in Palm Springs, California. Once the drone released its package on the ground, the vehicle disappeared back […]

With an exponential increase in the number of unmanned aircraft flying in U.S. airspace, Leidos Flight Service is in the process of testing its Leidos UAS Notification Service, which was launched in September. The service is being tested as part of the FAA UAS Pathfinder Program with Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway, which uses UAS […]

Anyone who offers up hard numbers for the drone population in the United States is merely guessing, especially since the FAA’s new Part 107 rule took effect last year. While the precise number isn’t really known, the trend is certainly clear: there will be more and more drones from now on. What worries people who […]

One of the more popular selling points for most drones is that should something sever the communications link between the aircraft and the pilot or ground command, the machine knows the way home and normally returns automatically … except of course when it doesn’t, as the U.S. Army experienced in late January. An Army Shadow […]

The ever-dwindling population of honeybees in North America and Europe is not a new problem. With a few rare blips on the survival tracking charts, nearly 45 percent of honeybee colonies still die annually. A group of Japanese scientists, however, believe a tiny drone could become a solution to the pollination deficit caused by the […]

There’s a lot of buzz going on lately about drones and how they might be integrated into our daily lives, with the FAA creating rules for commercial use and a growing list of private companies developing pilotless modes of aerial transportation. Package-delivery company UPS added to the conversation Monday with the first test of its […]

Welcoming drone pilots into the general aviation community, the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association announced a new line of memberships for pilots of unmanned aircraft. “Drone pilots are seeking their place in the larger world of aviation and looking for opportunities to expand their experience,” said AOPA President Mark Baker. “This is an ideal time […]

Look out, Uber and Airbus, two companies already on record as seriously involved in efforts to offer pilotless drones to transport people around urban areas. Enter the city of Dubai’s transportation agency, which this week announced plans to offer rides aboard computer-operated drones around the Middle Eastern city beginning this July. Dubai’s head of transportation […]

Opportunities for unmanned aircraft system (UAS) pilots are now wide-open under the new FAA small UAS (sUAS) Part 107 rule, which legalizes and regulates these air ops. Drone work in the U.S. film and TV industry has also taken flight recently under the agency’s Section 333 exemption waivers. Meanwhile, demand for experienced commercial and military […]