Spearheading Safety In Unmanned Aircraft Operations

By: Rex Alexander

A relatively new group that is making waves in the safety arena is the Unmanned Aircraft Safety Team or UAST. First formed in October of 2016 the UAST is a part of the FAA's very successful Safety Team program and is an industry-government partnership committed to ensuring the safe operations of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS). The organization is set up to be an open membership so that anyone interested may join. However, Greg Deeds (pictured), Steering Group lead over Technology Exploration Group gave the following warning. Anyone interested in joining had better be prepared to roll up their sleeves and do the work. The group meets at least quarterly and operates as a consensus-based organization.

To date there are an estimated 1.4 million registered UAS users in the United States with over 400,000 of which operating as fully commercial programs. That being said, the actual number of UAS aircraft in existence is unknown. UAS changes of significant note that are going to be coming to out in the very near future include authorization for conducting night operations without a waiver as well as conducting flight operations over people without a waiver.

According to FAA and NTSB statistics the number of known incidents of an actual collision between a UAS and another aircraft is currently one ... that being the collision between the DJI Phantom 4 drone with a U.S. Army UH-60M Black Hawk helicopter in September 2017. According to current stats, all other reported incidents have so far proven to be things such as bird strikes.

The primary goal of the organization is to raise the safety bar to new heights through education. This centers around gathering accurate and viable data that can then be used to identify trends in the industry such that risks can then be identified, and action taken to mitigate those risks in a timely manner. These trends include things such as maintenance reliability in specific makes and models of aircraft, maintenance trends, and operational issues. The organization has taken steps to produce a document for the governance of gathering data for the sake of protecting those who help provide it.

The group has also assisted in advancing the UAS knowledge test to help support the FAAís educational efforts in the UAS space as well. Additionally, the group is working hard to create a specific NASA ASRS reporting form that is more specific to UAS operations and operators than the current submission process.

(Images provided by author)

FMI: UAST Home Page