The U.S. Department of Transportation plans to audit the processes for approving and overseeing waivers for small unmanned aircraft systems (UAS). These waivers by the Federal Aviation Administration generally grant UAS operators certain aspects of flight that current regulations prohibit, such as beyond-line-of-sight operation.
The Department of Transportation is moving to require recreational drone users to register with the federal government. The agency said Monday that it is developing a task force to craft a registration system for drones after an increase in the number of pilots who have reported sightings of the devices during flights. The Federal Aviation Administration has been in the process of developing rules for commercial drones, but the new rules would also apply to recreational devices.
The Department of Transportation was asked by some members of Congress to check in on the FAA to see if the agency was going to meet the September 2015 deadline for safely integrating unmanned aircraft into the National Airspace System. With almost a year to go for overall approval, the DOT says things aren’t looking so good.
