After my first three modules I have gained a good level of confidence that I can fly safely. Now the legalities, Weather requirements and factors of drone performance have been laid out, the A2 CofC goes into greater depth on key operating principles and flight procedures. On the other hand while theoretically learning about distances is very useful for staying legal, my first drone flight shattered my understanding of how high and far you can legally go. This week then will provide a snapshot summary into what the A2 CofC teaches operators about operating principles when flying and about the ins and outs of flight procedures in the hope to provide a good outlook on what the course is and why it is beneficial. More so, I will talk about the big takeaways I had from my first supervised drone flight.
Get the UAVhub A2 CofC course here: https://www.uavhub.com/pages/a2-qualification
UAS Operating Principles
Collision avoidance
Going into greater detail on collision avoidance, after mentioning key aspects in the air law module, the A2 CofC instructor put a great emphasis on the principles that you need to consider at this level. While VLOS was emphasised in the summary of collision avoidance, this gave greater detail as to why VLOS is necessary, as aviation law makes Drone operators responsible for avoiding accidents with all other aircraft. To do so we apply the ‘see and avoid’ principle to all flying in the open category, and means that VLOS is key to making sure we fly safe and fly legal; in other words, we should not rely on our drone camera feed to A. know it’s position in the sky and B. look for obstacles around our airspace. A common problem with flying though is that our perception of heights, distances and speed can differ depending on aircraft; in the case of drone operating we will commonly perceive that the drone will travel quicker, higher and further than it is actually going. On the other hand bigger aircraft, like manned aircraft for example, will be perceived as travelling slower, lower and closer than they actually look so try to be aware of your drone at all times.
Stress and pressure
Stress and pressure is an interesting topic as it highlights the importance of you, as a pilot, and the importance of drone safety. You will face go/no-go decisions that can be straightforward, relating to aircraft function, weather and lack of planning time that can decide for you whether to fly or not fly. For instance, what if your propeller is chipped and have no way to repair it? No-go, Is there precipitation? No-go and have you had time to see what airspace is around your location that could be a ground hazard or restricted? If not then No-go. Other circumstances instead relate to self-induced pressure, i.e. if you fly commercial you want to deliver a good product, which are measured more personally. Ultimately though the thought process for if you feel pressured to go/no-go is again simple, you should never feel pressured to do anything you are not comfortable with doing with the aircraft. Even if the client insists you fly to get some data, in illegal circumstances, it is your decision to stop flying and reschedule as at the end of the day you are responsible for the aircraft (remember article 241?). Additionally sickness can be technically complicated because of how different substances affect your performance and function, but I’ll cover that later.
Congested area operations
In drone aviation there are many resources to see the airspace around the UK, it is therefore important to use them if you are doing complicated planning and preparation. In congested area operations, and commercial operations, this is especially necessary to do. Priority therefore is to find the position of the flight, so we should find a grid reference and latitude and longitude reference for the flight position. After gathering that info use websites, like www.notaminfo.com/ukmap and www.dronesafe.uk/restrictions, to show the airspace around us and the restrictions of drone operations around us as well. The whole point of this process is to off set any possible risks and mitigate the risks that we may face; to do that further we can make note of the nearest hospital/A+E, the contact details of the nearest air traffic control and inform the police beforehand on the 101 service so they know you are legal and can back you in case they get any complaints.
Hazard identification is an all encompassing term that refers to the main types of hazard you will encounter. The course covers these in detail, but you will need to consider factors such as weather, roads, vehicles, people, overhanging cables, airspace and access/escape by thinking about the threat they could pose and how you can oppose said threat in your planning and preparation. Weather is a simple example, as you can think about how to keep things dry or how to keep things cool and about how to prepare yourself for weather conditions, or in the case of airspace you want to consider if there are military bases around as that could result in low flying aircraft in your airspace or you may need to survey the site to see other hazards such as overhanging cables, the business of roads and the amount of people activity around you also.
Medical fitness
Medical fitness is also a serious factor in drone aviation, as after all it is what affects your judgment and capability to fly. In the case of substances, it is largely that you cannot fly, should not fly or that the decision to fly will be made on your judgement considering different factors. The cannot fly category for instance puts a blanket ban on the consumption of alcohol and recreational drugs or their after effects, and in a commercial setting consider if the small print of your insurance says anything about the use of drugs and alcohol and how that can effect your policy. In the should not fly category, any self-medication that you may take for an infection or headache, could cause safety concerns for you and the drone and prescription drugs may have side effects so check the small print to see what their effects are on driving and heavy machinery (If there are side effects, ask if there is an aviation safe alternative). And finally in the judgemental category, energy drinks could and could not affect you so you need to judge yourself on why you are taking them; if it is to combat tiredness, then it is largely advisable not to fly.
Medications will also affect judgment and capability. Anglicise Medication like Paracetamol and Ibuprofen are considered safe if used as directed, but can be indicative of underlying conditions, while Antibiotics could have short or long term effects and Anti-histamines will affect RP performance and are inadvisable. Alternatively, cough suppressants and sleeping tablets without anti-histamines are generally safe to use with caution; with the consumption of caffeine and decongestants (i.e. nasal spray) are also advised to be used with caution. Fatigue is also a factor to consider, but the technicalities of that are again better handled in the course.
Evaluating distance
In planning and preparation, evaluating distance can be a factor to consider. To evaluate distance in this respect flight planning software can help but google maps can also be helpful, as you can use pins in locations to know the distances BETWEEN points to make your horizontal clearance stays legal, but on site you can use objects such as cones and tape measures while of course keeping in mind our legally required separation distances to be ALARP (as low as reasonably practical).
Flight Planning
A module planned around a commercial work, this module was a nice change of pace and admittedly is the first module that will only apply to a specific group of people. Based on a breakdown of a document found in the UAV Hub resource library, which you will have access to via the UAV Hub learning portal, it is ultimately a very specialist module to UAVHub so I will mention the general things to consider in this scenario.
Firstly, a pre-site survey is the essential bedrock to your early planning. If you are talking to a client, try to get as much site information from them as possible so ask about local services nearby, about the local terrain and if they are near any danger areas. After that call or chat find directions to the nearest hospital, and A+E, and create a site map from a google maps screenshot. In site mapping with map and geography screenshots you can get a general impression of what uninvolved persons may be around you, to inform your separation distances, and it is also worth doing this while you have the clients in case you have any extra questions. More so, use google maps to measure distances so you have an idea of how far or close you can fly to others and consider if you need an observer with you to check if the buildings you suspect have uninvolved persons do actually have uninvolved persons; doing this can help your separation distances too. Next thing to do is to check for aviation hazards using sites said earlier, or www.dronesafetymap.com/, and then carry out a risk assessment.
All planning at this point is completed on site, but it is good practice to do a site survey and risk assessment on site on the day of the job. The reason for this being that you can be sure of what you have already noted and so you can ensure that you do not miss any risks or hazards that may have missed through your general research of the area. For example if you perhaps did not see any overhanging cables over your airspace online, than an on site risk assessment can prepare you for that risk; or maybe circumstances may be different between your initial site survey and on site survey, so you may have to change your approach slightly to increase risk mitigation.
My First Drone Flight
After learning about Operating principles this week, I had a surprise opportunity to do my first drone flight through miscellaneous connections. I was not thinking about practically flying this early in my A2 CofC learning, as even though the course could be theoretically completed in a day and a bit if you did the modules back to back I wanted to know everything I needed to first. It is however worth noting the A2 CofC does require you to sign a self-declaration showing that you can fly a drone safely and an X amount of manoeuvres and plans, whereas before I believe they did a physical examination before the times of COVID. In this respect I think there is a risk that some could complete the course and say yes I can can fly, but not actually be able to, without having to provide evidence but I always planned to fly and train before I signed that form like a model student would.
After getting in touch with a friend of a friend in the local area, we quickly arranged a flying session over an open field nearby to negate any risk of accident or injury. Conditions were not ideal, but the pilot supervising me was very helpful and nice. On the other hand, he found it very funny that I thought I was 50m high but I was only 12m. Remember what I said earlier that our perception of height, distance and speed will vary depending on the type of aircraft? On your first flight you will quickly learn how far you can actually go from your TOLP within the legal limits of the A2 CofC. The second thing you will likely pick up is how far an aircraft can move before going out of your VLOS, as the drone could quickly become a blip in the sky at full speed. While the Mavic Pro 2 has one of the higher speed limits, the distance it could travel was exponentially further visually than I expected.
After getting over those ideas, the third thing you will notice is how the wind affects your idea of where the drone is, and thus shows you why maintaining a VLOS is important at this level of aviation, and why looking at the monitor is important as well if you cannot find a sense of direction. Fourth thing to notice is the obvious effect of the wind on your acceleration and braking and that flying into headwind does indeed give you more control even if it could drain your battery faster. While I thought managing battery life would be an issue with these sort of drones, the procedure of landing, changing battery and taking off again was fairly seamless. And in reality we only had to do that twice in our one and a half hour session.
Overall, the opportunity was useful for me to understand the physical limitations of the regulations and was useful for me to get an idea of the external factors that could affect my flying. To get a visual idea of my VLOS and separation distance completely shattered my ideas of how far I could go from myself, but in a positive way because I did have anxiety about how far the drone could fly away from me and come back beforehand and I was worried about how far I could go visually within the limits of the regulations. On the other hand I learned that maintaining VLOS can sometimes be tricky and that good positioning from you is the best way to help that insecurity. On the whole if you are a first time flyer doing the A2 CofC like myself, I recommend you have a flight sooner rather than later primarily because you’ll sooner understand what the distances they detail in the course mean in a visual sense and you’ll sooner understand the way you need to fly to stay within the regulations. Although I think learning about air law and meteorology first has really helped me to understand what I did on the day, building practice and experience is just as essential as learning about the regulations and theory that go into drone aviation as well.
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