Commercial drone operation and the law

In this video, the second of three videos on drone rules and regulations in South-Africa, we will shift our focus more towards the commercial operation of drones in SA. What does the South African Civil Aviation Authority - SACAA regulations say about commercial flying in SA? Our guest is Dean Polley from Commercial Unmanned Aircraft Association of Southern Africa to answer a few questions such as:

- What is a RPL

- What is a ROC

- The process to start flying commercially etc.

All these and more will be answered right here. Aerial Drone Solutions: http://www.aerialdronesolutions.co.za

SACAA drone regulations (part 101): http://www.caa.co.za/Documents/RPAS/P...

Commercial Unmanned Aircraft Association of South Africa: https://www.caasa.co.za

We would like to thank Percy Rudman Snr and his amazing team at Eagle Air - PTYLtd based at Wonderboom National Airport for making their facilities available for us to record our videos. http://www.eagleair.co.za

Ruben Delmage  

Hi guys, my name is Ruben Delmage from Aerial Drone Solutions and last time we spoke about the recreational flying or hobby flying of drones in South Africa. And in this episode, we'll be focusing on the commercial side of drones in South Africa, specifically relating to licensing and the certifications of drone regulations in South Africa. And we've got the expert here this morning. His name is  Dean Polley from CUAASA, also known as the commercial unmanned aircraft association of South Africa to tell us a little bit more. Dean, Good day, are you well.

Dean Polley 

Morning Ruben, and thank you for inviting me back on your show.

Ruben Delmage  

So the last time we spoke about recreational and also hobby flying of drones in South Africa. But let's dive into the commercial side of drones in South Africa and let's start off with the licensing. Tell us a little bit more about the license and RPL. What exactly is an RPL?

Dean Polley  

So an RPL is the equivalent of a PPL. There is a formal curriculum that stands for remote pilot license. So to license that you do in order to legally fly a drone, or an unmanned system for commercial gain.

Ruben Delmage  

So let's say I've done my RPL. And I've got my drone license, I've gone through the whole thing, the whole the theory as well as the practical. Can I now go out and fly commercially in South Africa.

Dean Polley 

So strictly speaking, no, just having an RPL on its own is not going to enable you to do that. You need to operate within a company that's the holder of what's called an ROC RPAS operating certificate. That’s the equivalent of an AOC in manned aviation. So an aircraft operating certificate. So you need to have a formal company established. You need to apply for a services license with a services licensing counsel from the Department of transport. And then once you've got your ASL you can then apply for an ROC. And that's quite a long and complex process. So you need the ROC. The pilot that then operates the drone needs to have an RPL. But you need to operate under with under an operating company that has got an ROC.

Ruben Delmage

Exactly. And that is also not all. You mentioned earlier, that RPL is pretty much equivalent to or very close to a PPL. And I do believe you need to go through the medical you need to do your restricted radio maybe just elaborate on on that.

Dean Polley  

So yeah, so the RPL curriculum, is it's about a week of theory and you go through pretty much what you'd go through for a PPL, you need to do a restricted radio license. You need to do an English proficiency test. You need to get a class three medical certificate. You do air law. You do things like climate and weather. So it's it's quite comprehensive. And then from there you do, I think it's about another week of actual practical flying.

Ruben Delmage 

Yeah. And also what you also need to do further on when you've got the RPL. You've got your ROC in place, you've got your restricted radio, you've got your medical in place, there's still a lot of stuff that needs to get bought in it you need to use for your commercial operations. I'm thinking about stuff like your fire extinguisher, you'll need to have cones to mark off and all that stuff. And that's very important for commercial operations in South Africa.

Dean Polley  

Correct. So, one of the key documents that are ROC would have is an ops spec, and an ops spec it will describe the nature of the operations and the equipment that is required. The equipment is required to operate is quite standard and that's actually listed in Part 101, so you can go and see what is needed. Reflected jackets, cones, cordoned off areas, fire extinguishers etc. The other thing that ROC holder needs to hold is a third party liability insurance that needs to be in place as well. And then the last thing which is also very important is every single drone or aircraft that is to be operated under an ROC needs to have what's called an RLA .The RLA is really the air worthiness of the aircraft and that is a letter of approval that's issued from the Civil Aviation Authority.

Ruben Delmage  

And that's also important for the people making use of commercial pilots, please make sure that the drone has been RLA’d and the way you can see that is, the drone will have what's called a Zulu Tango registration number on the drone itself, so make sure that you check out for that as well. Lastly, Dean just before you wrap up, I think it's also important to make mention of even though you've got your RPL and also your RLA’d drone and also the ROC you need to have what's called controlled airspace on your radio as well to be able to fly in controlled airspace.

Dean Polley  

So yes, the flying of a drone and controlled airspace is very clearly defined as well in the regulations. Currently, you need to have your drone fitted with a transponder. And it needs to be at least a mode c slash Mode S transponder. The new transponders that on the market today is also kind of conforming to the new ADSB standard. And then you need to put a what's called a camu application in, so a camu that's with ATNS it's a central airspace management application. So it's a standard form that you get from them. And you pretty much define the parameters of your operation, and the stakeholders will review it and sign it off. It typically takes about two days to get something done

Ruben Delmage  

And very important. You need to have communication with the tower, either via telephone or like we with the VHF radio radio, and you need to have that clearly stipulated on your ops spec as well, they are allowed to do that. And again, all the info will be available on the CAA website. You're more than welcome to click on the link below. We'll have everything available there for you. Dean, thank you. That's it for this episode, we’ll will be back on the next episode and we'll focus a little bit more about what can happen to you. If you make use as a company make use of an illegal drone pilot. What is the regulations say about that and the laws in South Africa state about that.

Recreational flying and the law

In this video, the first of three videos on drone rules and regulations in South-Africa, we will focus on recreational and hobby flying. What does the SACAA regulations say about recreational or hobby flying?

Our guest is Dean Polley from CUAASA (Commercial Unmanned Aircraft Association of South-Africa) to answer a few questions such as:

- Can I fly without a license?

- Where am I allowed to fly and where not? All these and more will be answered right here.

SACAA drone regulations (part 101): http://www.caa.co.za/Documents/RPAS/Part%20101%20-%20RPAS%20Workshops.pdf

Solutions Sensors Aircraft Software Services: http://www.ssass.co.za

Commercial Unmanned Aircraft Association of South Africa: https://www.caasa.co.za/cuaasa/

We would like to thank Percy and his amazing team at Eagle Air based at Wonderboom Airport for making their facilities available for us to record our videos. http://www.eagleair.co.za

Ruben 

Hi guys, my name is Ruben Delmage from Aerial Drone Solutions. And as promised, this is the first of three videos regarding drones and drone regulations in South Africa and all the different industries that you can use drones for in South Africa. So please make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel click on the subscribe button below and also click on the notification step to be notified whenever new video gets uploaded. And also follow us on social media, Facebook and also on Instagram. We've got the expert here this morning, Dean Polley from CUAASA to tell us a little bit more about drones in South Africa, also known as the commercial unmanned aircraft association of South Africa. Dean Good morning and welcome.

Dean

Morning Ruben and thank you for inviting me onto your show.

Ruben

Dean, give us a little bit of background on yourself.

Dean

I started flying drones in October 2013 When I purchased my first DJI Phantom, and at the time I used it pretty much as a hobby, doing aerial photography and aerial filming. And I pretty soon saw that there was a commercial opportunity there. So I started offering at that time, sort of basic aerial services. And of course, the regulations came into place in July, which stopped uncontrolled use of drones for commercial use, and I subsequently then formed my company, Aerial Vision Africa, which, by the way, we've just rebranded now and renamed and we can give you more details about that later. Initially the idea was to offer a service like a lot of other people or companies wanted to do at the time, and the regulation was quite complex and costly. And I changed my business model somewhat into rather selling solutions to drone operators than being a drone operator myself. So we do offer services. But right now I actually outsource them to companies that have got all the legalities in place the licenses, etc. In the process with the regulations that were launched in July, I joined CUAASA, which was then a newly established association. And I eventually served on the executive committee or the exco. I was the president for two years from 2016 to 2018. I'm still a member of CUAASA. I've stepped down and I've let the sort of younger blood get involved now with continuing with the scope, of CUAASA. Also CUAASA is a sub affiliate of umbrella body, which is the commercial aviation association of Southern Africa and I now serve on the board of directors of CAASA as well.

Ruben

Tell us a little bit more about exactly what CUAASA does and how they started.

Dean 

So first of all, if we go back to I think it was 2013. With the advent advent of drones coming onto the market, the Civil Aviation Authority got a bit of a shock when suddenly there were drones flying around. And of course, there was nothing controlling them and nothing regulating it. So what they did is they issued an outright ban on the flying of drones. At the time, it had a severe impact on a number of companies that were already operating for many years using radio controlled helicopters and homemade drones to provide the very services that's been provided today. And so they approached the Civil Aviation Authority and said, well, you can't just do an outright ban, you need to at least bring in some form of regulations. So CUAASA was then formed at the time with a group of stakeholders to engage with Civil Aviation Authority to basically force them to put in the regulations which became Part 101. Going forward CUAASA was made up of members of the industry that have vested interests, and we became the mouthpiece of people wanting to legalise, wanting to get into the drone industry, applying for the R.O.C.’s, and we were sort of like the mouthpiece for representing them and liaising on a behalf with Civil Aviation Authority.

Ruben 

So you briefly touched on the commercial side, but let's focus on this episode more specifically on recreational or hobby flying. So let's say for instance, I went out December, I bought myself a brand new drone. Where can I fly? Can I fly without having a license?

Dean 

So yes, if you if you're going to get a drone, which is under 25 kilograms, it's classified as what's called an SUAS. So it's a small unmanned aircraft system. Typically what you're looking at is the the sort of sub three kilogram range of consumer drones or hobby drones, if you want to call it that. The regulations actually makes provision for that. So you don't need an RPL. You don't need any form of licensing, but there are strict regulations that govern how and where you can fly it. So some of the most obvious ones is first of all, you can't fly over a built up area. So your backyard is out of the question. Because you need to maintain a distance of at least 50 meters of any structure. So you know, if if you've got a one, maybe if you have a one hectare to stand, yes, you can fly around your garden. But I mean, it's still it's as border-lining on going against the regulations. You can't fly over a public road. You can't fly over people. You can't fly within 50 meters of a public road. You can't fly within 10 kilometers of an airport. So if you take if you take Pretoria for instance, 10 kilometer radius around Waterkloof is basically no fly zone. You can't fly in controlled airspace. So public spaces I mean, obviously National key points like the the Union Buildings, power stations etc. So it's it's actually quite a pity because the drones have been designed for getting you eyes in the sky and doing very creative filming aerial filming work and where would you want to do this in the most scenic places possible. So the golden rule is, if it's over any private property, you need to have written permission from the owner. And if you're on holiday, those are the parameters with which you could we where you can operate them is what I've just listed and to find out exactly what that is, is clearly spelled out in the Part 101 regulations. And you can get that of the CAA website. And the other options is to join a SAMA club, the South African model aircraft Association club, a lot of them allow the flying of drones so you can go there and within the base of a SAMA airfield. And of course within the rules, you can go and fly recreational drones as well. It is extremely important to remember that even though there's a lot of open spaces, no public roads and buildings, flying in a national park is an absolute No, no. And there are heavy penalties if you caught flying in a national park like Kruger Park or any of the other national parks.

Ruben 

So Dean, you mentioned earlier about your company tell us a little bit more.

Dean

So I founded Aerial Vision Africa in 2015. Incidentally, we just renamed and rebranded the company in January this year and the company is now known as SSASS. It stands for Solutions, Sensors, Aircraft, Software and Services. And if you want to find out more about the company, go to the website www.ssass.co.za.

Ruben 

And that's basically the summary for this week's episode. So please make sure that you educate yourself very well. Dean mentioned all the do's and the don'ts, like you said, earlier in Part 101 on the CAA website, you will find all those regulations and we will make the link available on our website www.aerialdronesolutions.co.za. So that's it for this episode, we will be back next time to focus a little bit more on the commercial side of the drones and the drone regulations in South Africa. So please make sure to stay updated or stay tuned in for that. Make sure to subscribe on our YouTube channel, click on the subscribe button below and again on the notifications button. And that's it for this time. We'll be back next time