The League of Landowners and Drone Operators (LLDO)

The League of Landowners and Drone Operators (LLDO) was formed for the purpose of asserting the rights of the landowner to exclusive control of the immediate reaches of the enveloping atmosphere over his/her property and promulgating guidelines for the safe operation of Drones within that airspace.

The FAA’s seven year moratorium on commercial UAV operations in the interest of safety has had unintended consequences.  This doesn’t just affect farmers.  Everyone I know eats food.  Withholding UAV produced data from farmers reduces their ability to increase yields and subsequently increases food prices.  This hurts everyone.  Also, without timely data farmers have to use more herbicides and pesticides as infestations spread.  In addition to the expense, this means greater contamination of the environment than would otherwise be necessary.

Farm yields have suffered from lack of data, and food prices are rising.  The environment has suffered from over application of herbicides and pesticides due to lack of data.  Businesses that were, or were planning to, provide this data have gone out of business, with subsequent loss of jobs and tax revenues.  The technological lead of the U.S. in small UAVs has now gone to China and other countries.  This has become a man made disaster as the result of indecision by the FAA, and it continues under the excuse of safety.  How is it safe to fly the same aircraft, in the same airspace, taking the same picture, for a hobby, and not safe to do the same thing commercially.  This FAA decision defies all logic.

The Supreme Court ruling under Causby v. United States proclaimed, “The landowner owns at least as much of the space above the ground as the can occupy or use in connection with the land.”  Therefore, the landowners, not the FAA, must take responsibility for operations in their airspace.  It is the intent of the League to promulgate guidance for the safe and effective use of UAVs in that airspace, with or without input from the FAA.

Let us begin:

DEFINE THE LANDOWNERS’ AIRSPACE

The lateral boundaries are easy, they are the surveyed boundaries of the landowners’ property.  The flight must remain therein at all times.   The vertical boundary is open to discussion.  What constitutes, “at least as much of the space above the ground as he can occupy or use?”  What constitutes, “the immediate reaches of the enveloping atmosphere?”  Until the FAA or the Courts render a decision, how about starting at 400 feet above ground level (AGL), the same as the recreational flyers?  That sounds reasonable.

In most rural areas this will be uncontrolled airspace, well below the Navigable Airspace which the ATO controls.  Why does this matter?  Because Air Traffic Control  does not provide separation between aircraft in uncontrolled airspace.  “See and Avoid” is the rule for traffic separation.  When the drone operator sees a manned aircraft he/she SHALL take action to avoid it.  Simple, yes?  Which brings us to:

RULES OF THE ROAD AND RIGHT OF WAY

There are no winners in a mid air collision, and they should be avoided at all costs.  Since the ATO is not responsible for separating traffic in uncontrolled airspace, therefore, “See and Avoid” would apply.

Historically, right of way is given to the least maneuverable craft. That’s just common sense. Drones are difficult to see, especially by a pilot enclosed in a cockpit with limited visibility and heavy task loading. Therefore, collision avoidance is the responsibility of the Drone operators.

There must be two operators of the Drone, the Pilot Flying (PF) and the Pilot Monitoring (PM).  That makes four eyes to spot conflicting traffic.  However, usually the manned aircraft will be heard well before it can be seen, thus giving even greater opportunity to take evasive action.  Naturally, the Drone shall ALWAYS give way to the manned aircraft.  Typically, the Drone will have descended to a landing before the manned aircraft even knows one was flying in the area.  This makes the “See and Avoid” safer between a Drone and a manned aircraft than between two manned aircraft.  This definitely satisfies the equivalent level of safety issue.

Visual Line Of Sight (VLOS) must be maintained at all times, otherwise “See and Avoid” is — well, void.

The greatest number of manned aircraft using the rural airspace under the Navigable Airspace are the Aerial Applicators.  Which brings us to:

CONFLICT WITH MANNED AERIAL APPLICATORS

Although aerial applicators share the same lateral airspace as the Drones, this is not a high risk situation.  Crop dusters typically “ferry” (travel between the point of loading and spraying) at or above 300 feet AGL.  This is to avoid being surprised by another crop duster pulling up out of a field in a “Duster Turn.”  This is well above the normal height of the imaging swath of 60 to 120 feet for the Drone.  In addition, the Drone operator SHALL descend to a hover, and land to deconflict any encounter with a manned aircraft.  This is really necessary for the Drone pilot, as the wake turbulence from the larger manned aircraft flying overhead could upset the Drone with expensive results.

While manned aircraft use “see and avoid” for traffic separation, the Drone operators use “Hear, then See and Avoid” to provide and even greater level of safety.

Coordination with the aerial applicators operating in the area is not only neighborly, it can improve scheduling to prevent having to sit out a planned flight while a manned crop duster works an adjacent field and overflies the boundaries during turns.  That leaves privacy issues:

PRIVACY ISSUES

Peeking drones are in the news lately, however this privacy issue is not germane to agricultural operations.  There are two reasons for this.  First, the agricultural Drones are operated in rural areas and only over the land owners property.  Second, orthogonal photography is used for agricultural imaging, meaning the camera is pointing straight down at the crop.  Not at the neighbors window.

IN CONCLUSION

Currently we are talking about an air vehicle weighing less than 55 pounds, flying at an altitude of less than 400 feet AGL, at an airspeed of approximately 10 meters per second (less than 30 miles per hour), with a flight duration of 15-25 minutes, all this only over the land owners property.  Also, we are talking about professional agriculturists acting responsibly with a real need to have the data that can only be supplied by UAVs under their direct control.  The UAVs they fly must be both safe and reliable to meet their requirements.  These are not thrill seekers trying to capture outrageous video of spectacular events, and flying near and/or over people in public places.  The FAA needs to be cognizant of the risk/reward factors in their decisions concerning authorization of commercial UAV operations.