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Drone Search and Rescue Operation Wins Fight Against FAA
An anonymous reader writes: Back in February, officials at the Federal Aviation Administration told a Texas search-and-rescue team they couldn't use drones help locate missing persons. The team, which is called EquuSearch, challenged the FAA in court. On Friday, the court ruled (PDF) in favor of EquuSearch, saying the FAA's directive was "not a formal cease-and-desist letter representing the agency's final conclusion." EquuSearch intends to resume using the drones immediately. This puts the FAA in the position of having to either initiate formal proceedings against EquuSearch, which is clearly operating to the benefit of society (as opposed to purely commercial drone use), or to revisit and finalize its rules for small aircraft entirely. The latter would be a lengthy process because "Congress has delegated rule making powers to its agencies, but the Administrative Procedures Act requires the agencies to provide a public notice and comment period first."
You can visit the FAA comment site to comment on proposed rule changes that address this issue. The comment period ends on July 25. The proposed rules will cripple drone use by civilians and also cripple most RC aircraft operations in the USA. The proposal is simply draconian. Check it out:
http://www.regulations.gov/#!d...
"Congress has delegated rule making powers to its agencies"
This is what makes those agencies so intimidating. They have given up control.
Can we have the FAA institute formal proceedings against Equusearch so they can get bitchslapped by whatever court they try it in AND have to go through the rulemaking again as well? Please?
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get you
One would hope that this - plus the FAA going after the congress-critter on the committe that oversees the FAA - changes a few things for the better.
...clearly operating to the benefit of society (as opposed to purely commercial drone use)...
Is this some kind of anglo-american thing? Over here the reason commercial entities get tax breaks is because they should be operating to the benefit of society. Economic speculation and other short-sighted ventures are tolerated as the exception and not the norm of society.
All rites reversed 2010
Using Drones in search and rescue operations if highly economical.
After all, using humans in search and rescue can lead to unintended deaths of the search and rescue teams
and not to forget the monetary cost of the operation and equipment.
Using Drones equipped with Hell-Fire missiles to eradicate survivors will cut costs substantially. And, given that search
and rescue is considered a Military Operation, all insurance policies of the victims will be null and void thus
pleasing the insurance companies who reward their executives lavishly with cash, drugs and prostitutes.
Waddgodd simply asked a question and you go postal. This is not the work of a "screaming idiot" Calm down. This is a serious issue that is not well served by rants such as yours. If I had to pick the screaming idiot here I wouldn't pick Waddgodd.
You say you operate illegally, and then you go off on the "douchbags" and "idiots" that also operate illegally. Take a look at yourself.
The regulations might need to be revised, but making the entire RC hobby illegal is the wrong approach. If you really have been flying for 30 years you would think differently about this.
I've gotten involved in a couple of rounds of agency rule-making before and it taught me a few things. I learned that this is where the skills learned writing papers in school can really be useful. The folks at the FAA think they know something about this topic, so they tend to discount comments that sound like the person is spouting off emotionally without having any real knowledge of the subject matter. On the other hand, they don't know everything that everyone is doing in the field, so they'd like to hear comments from people doing different things. For example, my local university has a drone research center and the FAA doesn't know what all the research center is doing, so they can appreciate comments about using drones in a research and educational setting.
IF you really care about this topic, it may be worth putting some time into writing your comments well, or supporting an organization who will, such as the model aircraft association.
The court ruled against Equusearch, dismissing its case against the FAA because the letter telling Equusearch that they are not allowed to use drone was not a cease-and-desist letter but rather of informational nature and so the court saw not fit to grant any relief.
So Equusearch has to pay for this case, and then provoke a cease-and-desist order from the FAA and another lawsuit and associated costs before they even have a chance to make their case.
Especially a Xerox 7775 copier, printer, fax, email and scan-to-network multifunction.
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
Now we know where all the rage is coming from. BitZtream doesn't want anybody playing on his playground.
Well, this is incorrect: "EquuSearch, which is clearly operating to the benefit of society (as opposed to purely commercial drone use)"
People who buy goods and services in the commercial sphere do so because they expect to benefit. Otherwise, they'd keep their money. Those people are part of society.
That the providers of those goods and services profit (or hope to, soon) doesn't change those facts.
There's no time like the present. Well, the past used to be.
Can't really speak for the poster you're chastising .... but perhaps at least some of his anger is perfectly justified? IMO, the core issue is that our government is still very much caught up in the idea that we want it to legislate our safety, even when it costs us our personal freedom.
Many U.S. citizens really aren't on-board with that. Some of us actually dare to question why, for example, we should receive citations from police for not wearing a helmet while riding a motorcycle, or for choosing not to fasten a seat-belt in a vehicle. (Heck, a cop on a motorcycle that has no seat belts might be the one to issue you that seat belt violation when you get pulled over! +1 Irony.)
By the same token, I think many of us (myself included) view the FAA's real reason for existence having to do with commercial aircraft. Letting them waste time and energy on drone aircraft, flying at low altitudes and operated for entertainment, hobby or other such purposes seems pretty far out of that scope of authority. The whole argument that, "A drone might crash land and injure somebody it falls on!" or "It might collide with someone's property and damage it!" strikes me as something we already have plenty of laws in place to handle. What happens when you drive your car off the road and damage someone's front yard and fence? What happens if you throw something heavy out an upstairs window and it hits some passer-by on the head as he walks down the sidewalk? Substitute a drone as the object engaged in the impact -- and you'll realize it can be handled without ANY advance regulation by the FAA.
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The comment period is for an interpretation of a law.
Is this all we get for a comment period on regs?
Call my crazy, but it seems like a comment period on proposed regs should have some actual proposed regs.
Lacking that, a good start would be a request for proposed rule sets.
or at keast a request for proposed methods for dividing up the NAS.
The FAA is letting time pass which is contrary to safety.
I would really like to know why.
Perhaps they just move slow.
Perhaps the election cycle.
Perhaps to wait for an accident to get \emergengy\ rule making authority.
This ruling was not a 'win' it just said that an e-mail suggesting you stop does not require you to stop. /. headline would be
This does bear on the issue of if there are actual enforcable regs in place.
Perhaps a better
Yet another FAA UAV ruling emphasizes the lack of proper procedure.