Introduction

Regulations for civil use of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS)/Drones are being developed and implemented at an accelerated pace by ICAO, JARUS, EU and EASA.

The European approach is:

• “operation centric” (i.e. the operator is the responsible entity for the safety of operations, even in the absence of a formal Type Certificate for the aircraft);
• based on three categories, with a growing level of involvement of the aviation authorities.

The course will focus on what the operators need to know to legally and safely fly drones for non-military purposes, including limitations in the “open” (A) category of UAS operations, requirements in “specific” (B) category and guidance for Pre-Defined Risk Assessments (PDRA) and operations manual.
In addition, the course will provide information on the operator certificate and on emerging operations in the “certified” (C) category for domestic operations. The C category is standardised by ICAO only when flying internationally.
Finally the course will provide authorities information on the establishment of geozones, on vertiprots and on respective UAS State flights.

Course Content

15 Lectures of about 30 minutes, distributed in 3 consecutive days, covering the following topics:

1. Introduction, terminology and course objectives

2. Risk-based approach for regulation of the three categories of UAS operations

3. Limitations for UAS operations in open category

4. Rules to toy aircraft and model aircraft

5. Examples of implementation of UAS geozones and minimum distance from aerodromes

6. Processes for operational authorisation in the specific category

7. Standard Scenarios (STS) and Pre-Defined Risk Assessments (PDRA)

8. JARUS recommendations for ‘one-to-several’ UAS operations

9. Voluntary Light UAS Operator Certificate (LUC) and related privileges

10. UAS Operator Manual

11. Cross-border UAS operations

12. Vertiports and docking systems for UAS operations

13. Emerging Advanced Air Mobility (AAM)

14. Examples of regulation of UAS State flights

15. Authorities’ tasks related to UAS operations

Learning Objectives

Upon completion of this course you will be able to:

• Explain the regulatory processes linked to “open” (A), “specific” (B) and “certified” (C) categories of UAS operations
• Apply the EU/EASA Commission Regulation 2019/947 and its three Annexes
• Identify national initiatives necessary for full application of 2019/947
• Choose the best approach to regulate UAS State flights
• Define policies to implement vertiports

Who should take this course

• Entrepreneurs and industry managers involved, or planning to become involved, in commercial operations of drones or training of remote pilots and which need to take informed decisions on respective business plans;
• Policy advisors, rulemaking officials and middle managers from Governments or CAAs, beloning to:
  1. EU/EASA Member States which contribute to development of EU common rules on UAS and to their subsequent implementation in respective States;
  2. Other ECAC States and in particular States candidates to EU accession, whose regulations should converge on the acquis commonautaire;
  3. Any other ICAO Contracting State wishing to better understand the three risk-based categories of UAS operations as described in the Foreword to Part IV of Annex 6 to the Chicago Convention;
• Inspectors from CAA and auditors from Notified Bodies/Qualified Entities, which will need to verify compliance with 2019/947 and associated insdustry standards;
• Instructors and examiners of remote pilots;
• Personnel from UAS manufacturers, Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs), UTM/U-space service providers (USSPs) or from aerodrome operators or other stakeholders, wishing to btter understand the regulation of UAS operations;
• Any other aviation professional, remote pilot or University professor, researcher or student, feeling the need to receive essential information on the operations of non-military drones to further develop her/his careers or competencies.

Pre-requisites

• Good command of English language
• Having passed the asynchronous course UAS-INI (ICAO STP)
• Participants are kindly requested to bring a laptop to the course to access course materials.

Duration

3 Days:

• Day 1: 09:00 – 17:00 hrs
• Day 2: 09:00 – 17:00 hrs
• Day 3: 09:00 – 17:00 hrs