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FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

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Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#91

Post by DannyBee »

cromulent wrote: post #16
bmelton wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The FAA has never been asked about it before, and the law of the land is "That which is not forbidden is legal." If there's no law against it, it's allowed. In this regard, it makes the statement that they are now banning it more true than they are still banning it, because they have never expressly disallowed it in the past (to my knowledge -- if incorrect, probably renders my point moot). Class E Airspace, that whi…

According to the FAA, they clarified this in 2007. No flying a UAS for commercial purposes, only one case has ever been approved. http://www.faa.gov/news/updates/?newsId=76240

at least the 2012 act requires them to allow flying UAS for commercial purposes (at the very least in the arctic, and likely elsewhere, depending on how you read it), and start a rulemaking about it

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#92

Post by cbhl »

baddox wrote: post #20
jkaljundi wrote: post #3

FAA has never allowed the use of drones to deliver packages. The right headline would be "The FAA does still not allow use of drones to deliver packages."

The FAA has no physical ability, and currently no legal authority, to allow or disallow the use of drones to deliver packages. This document is a set of rules that the FAA would like to carry legal weight, but which currently do not.

Regardless of the legal enforceability of these rules, I do think Amazon and the FAA need to be certain that a swarm of package-delivering drones don't cause, say, a passenger airplane crash or the failure of an airport's air traffic control system, before we see general deployment of these drones.

I suspect the true difficult technical challenge here will be upgrading the planes and airports to handle hundreds of little drones flying around, with the legal framework to follow.

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#93

Post by rtpg »

sschueller wrote: post #82
headShrinker wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are wrong. I will abbreviate the article wrote on this very subject found here: http://fritzw.com/2013/12/03/theres-little-doubt-about-amazo... Amazon’s devices will be used for a single purpose they will be optimized in ways we have never seen in the multicopter industry. Their delivery scheme will be completely computer controlled, and will account for weather, airspeed, air density, and flight path, be…

Hasn't amazon been the one to only slowly adopt warehouse automation because it is cheaper to hire humans at $10 an hour? They did buy this company that makes little robots to move shelves around but it is nothing compared to a real system like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DeT-Hj2DXk

warehouses are different. It's very costly to send a guy to people's houses. They're simply limited by the walking/running rate of the human body, and traffic.

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#94

Post by Fuxy »

baddox wrote: post #73
bri3d wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The laws already changed to give them these powers - the 2012 FAA Modernization Act authorizes the FAA to make rules about UAS. However, the FAA's rulemaking abilities are limited by the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) and they haven't made any yet. So, even if the FAA's appeal fails, there will be a very short window (probably a year or less) before drones are explicitly regulated on less shaky footing.

> The laws already changed to give them these powers - the 2012 FAA Modernization Act authorizes the FAA to make rules about UAS. So claims the FAA. I can't make my way through the text of the law, nor can I find any legal summary or analysis other than the FAA's own claim that it gives them the authority to regulate UAS.

Everybody is arguing if they have the authority or not the more important question is why do they want to?

I find the FAA's attempt at banning anything commercial relating to drones a bit curious.

Step 1. Ban/regulate all commercial Drones.

Step 2. Require a license for commercial use.

Step 3. Profit?

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#95

Post by TerraHertz »

There's a fatal flaw.

Even if commercial delivery drones could be engineered to not crash into people or houses, not tangle with power lines, not cause accidents on highways, and not collide with each other once they are common, there's one thing that will instantly get them banned.

That will be the time someone uses a UAV to deliver 10 Oz of Semtex and a proximity sensor to someone they don't like. Exactly how are you going to stop that becoming common, if there are lots of UAVs in the air everywhere?

Actually this factor is probably why they will definitely be banned before there is any commercial take-up. Because there are some powerful people who very many people don't much like. And this application will be very unpopular with the powerful.

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#97

Post by gtirloni »

baddox wrote: post #72
hershel wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if they lose, won't the laws change to give them these powers ? I don't see something as potentially risky as drones running around unregulated.

> I don't see something as potentially risky as drones running around unregulated. Really? How about people hitting baseballs with bats unregulated? That's a heck of a lot more dangerous than most hobbyist drones, perhaps unless you're deliberately trying to do harm (in which case regulations don't matter).

It's risk assessment time. How many people are hitting baseball bats with unregulated bats today versus the number of drones that will be flying around cities delivering things all the time (and bumping into people on the sidewalks)? It takes little imagination to see that once drones are accepted as an efficient method of transportation, then companies will want to use them as much as possible, thus possibly creating a situation where we might want them to be regulated. Perhaps it's hard to see this happening from the few examples we've of hobbyist usage today but that is probably going to change (if they're accepted, etc, etc).

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#98

Post by gtirloni »

bri3d wrote: post #63
wavefunction wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don't you expect the FAA to "correctly regulate" drones? They've done a great job regulating commercial passenger and freight planes, leading to an excellent safety record for these vehicles.

I believe they'll err too far on the side of caution for small drones, stifling potential innovation by requiring expensive airworthiness certification, ADS-B, and flight planning for all drones which fly beyond line of sight, even those which are small enough not to pose a major threat to commercial aviation or bystanders. The FAA's roadmap here: http://www.faa.gov/about/initiatives/uas/media/UAS_Roadmap_2... indica…

If we put outselves in FAA's shoes, if they're too un-restrictive against drones now they run the risk of letting the situation get out of control in the future. As a thought exercise, how would the recommendations be enforced? Once drones are accepted as common transportation agents, how do you identify the one skipping the recommendations and, more importantly, who is flying it?

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#99

Post by gluczywo »

TerraHertz wrote: post #95

There's a fatal flaw. Even if commercial delivery drones could be engineered to not crash into people or houses, not tangle with power lines, not cause accidents on highways, and not collide with each other once they are common, there's one thing that will instantly get them banned. That will be the time someone uses a UAV to deliver 10 Oz of Semtex and a proximity sensor to someone they don't like. Exactly how are y…

You can use a car packed with explosives triggered by mobile phone to target someone you don't like. It's much easier and more reliable than the short-distance drone. Should we ban cars and mobile phones?

Re: FAA bans the use of drones to deliver packages

#100

Post by beedogs »

clarkm wrote: post #87
beedogs wrote: post #85

Good. What a terrible, terrible idea. Imagine these things falling from the sky a few times a day in major metro areas.

Imagine them delivering supplies to rural farmers.

They'd need to be awfully big then, wouldn't they?
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