Are drones the future?

Heck yes!!! Are you kidding me!? I don’t even know why I need to ask this. Have you ever flown one? No? Go spend $40 on a cheap drone and you will soon be hooked. One-day Amazon will be able to deliver said drone to you, in their delivery drones… Droneception.

They are loud, fast, agile and of course fun! Okay, okay, I know this article is a little one-sided, but who cares. DRONES!

Regulations and you

So as fun as I recently described these little bad bots, there are some drawbacks. The FAA has implemented a lot of different regulations. Such as, every single drone needs to be registered with the FAA. So they are registered, but what does that really mean?

“As of Dec. 21, 2015, the Federal Aviation Administration requires all owners of small unmanned aircraft, or drones, weighing between 0.55 and 55 pounds to register online before taking to the skies.” in addition to this here is a snippet of some of the regulations for recreational use:

[checklist icon=”fa-tags” iconcolor=”” circle=”” circlecolor=”” size=”20px” class=”” id=””][li_item icon=””]Fly no higher than 400 feet and remain below any surrounding obstacles when possible.[/li_item][li_item icon=””]Keep your Drone in eyesight at all times, and use an observer to assist if needed.[/li_item][li_item icon=””]Contact the airport or control tower before flying within five miles of an airport.[/li_item][li_item icon=””]Do not fly under the influence of alcohol or drugs. (Don’t drink and drone y’all).[/li_item][li_item icon=””]For a full list check here[/li_item][/checklist]

For Commercial use, a lot of the regulations are the same, but permission from the FAA is given on a case by case basis. So there are no guarantees you will get a permit.

Are these good or bad?

Well, it depends on what context we are talking about. For maximum amount of fun and recreation, these regulations put a slight damper. Yet on the other side, they kind of do help keep people safe.

For instance, in July last year that was a huge fire in the Cajon Pass in California. This fire quickly got out of control and blew itself up to the residential areas of the high desert. Guess what happened when someone decided to fly their drone to get a better look at the fire? It grounded all air support for the fire suppression. Effectively enabling the fire to grow faster and larger, “Thanks, drone pilot, I appreciate being evacuated.” but I digress. All-in-all some regulations are good, some are bad. As far as drones go, these are A-Okay in my book… so far.

Happy flying!