Tomorrow night we'll do podcast #27, which everyone here is welcome to participate in by listening to the chat live above and commenting and asking questions via the DIY Drones chat function. We'll be starting at 9:00 PM PST and will probably go about 40 minutes.
This week we'll by joined by Richard Hanson, who the AMA's Regulatory and Governmental Affairs operations. The regulatory process to introduce UAVs in the National Airspace (NAS) is a long, tortured and potentially disastrous ordeal for us. If it goes well, we'll be given guidelines or laws under which to operate, which create a category for small amateur UAVs that allows us to operate safely and still do interesting work. If it doesn't go well, we could be banned entirely.
Want to see what we're up against? Check out this thread, by another AMA official: Excerpt: "At one time our feelings and direction were to try to leave modeling under AMA as close to status quo as possible....In fact the words that were used were "To regulate model aviation by exempting it from regulation". I am fairly certain that idea is no longer valid!"
Rich's job is to ensure that model aircraft continue to have a place in the NAS, while allowing the hobby to move forward as technology allows. So far the AMA hasn't allowed UAVs on its airfields, but it has allowed FPV under certain conditions. We'll be talking to Rich about how it's going and what we can do to help.
As always you can subscribe to the podcast here. Tonight's livecast will be recorded and available as a podcast by Tues of the next week.
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