drones

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Proactive vs Reactive Asset Management with InView Assets: WATCH AGAIN

Join us to discuss the use of high-quality geospatial drone data in planned preventative maintenance and the benefits of using them: Proactive vs Reactive Asset Management.

In this webinar where we will look at proactive vs reactive asset management, the key learning points are as follows:

  • The value of precision-reality 3D twins as part of better asset management and planned preventative maintenance
  • The specific economic, social and environmental benefits of drones vs traditional inspection approaches; and,
  • Handling drone data – in the cloud vs local desktop versions

Speaker Bio:

David Holmes, Director at InView Assets

With a Geography and GIS background David is able to offer technical solutions to complex surveys and other digital scanning challenges. Has experience of working across a range of organisations including FTSE 100 companies and large charitable organisations. David is also a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and makes regular contributions to the Societies outreach programme

InView Assets

Hillside House

Langley Marsh

Wiveliscombe

Taunton

TA4 2UJ

Tel: 0333 7722 816

Email: info@inviewassets.co.uk

Further webinars can be seen here: www.arpas.uk/cpd

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IMechE UAS Competition 2025

The Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) UAS Challenge is an annual competition that brings together teams from universities around the world to design, build, and fly an unmanned aerial system (UAS). The challenge aims to encourage innovation and practical engineering skills among students.

Key Highlights of the IMechE UAS Challenge:

  1. Objective: Teams are tasked with developing a UAS that can perform a series of missions, which typically include autonomous flight, payload delivery, and obstacle avoidance.
  2. Rules and Guidelines: Each year, the challenge releases a new set of rules and guidelines that teams must follow. 
  3. Registration: Teams must register by a specified deadline to participate. For the 2024 challenge, registration is open until October 31, 2023
  4. Competition Phases: The challenge usually consists of several phases, including design reviews, flight readiness reviews, and the final fly-off event where teams demonstrate their UAS’s capabilities.
  5. Innovation and Skills: The competition emphasizes innovation, technical skills, and teamwork. It provides students with hands-on experience in aerospace engineering and project management

For more information

The mission: ”A natural disaster has occurred with a large, populated area devasted. Several thousand people are cut-off, without power, fresh running water, food or medicines. In built-up
areas buildings have come down and rubble is hampering efforts to deliver emergency supplies. Time is critical. A UAS supply mission is launched from the Rescue Centre some distance away at the end of the current logistics trail. The UAS operate automatically, launching, transiting rapidly, navigating via pre-planned waypoints in a tight urban environment with rapid changes of direction, delivering aid safely and accurately to where it is most needed. They return via a different route and remain at low level to de conflict from incoming UAS and overflying crewed aircraft. This requires them to fly through the streets of the damaged communities – this will involve narrow corridors and rapid changes of direction. The UAS repeats the mission in all weather conditions until the need to drop aid subsides, sustaining a vital lifeline until a large scale rescue mission can be mounted to evacuate people from the devastated area.”

Education and Development Objectives of the Event
The Challenge has a number of education and development objectives, in particular to:
 Provide an opportunity for students to learn practical aerospace engineering skills for their future careers;
 Provide an opportunity for students to explore innovative airframe and systems engineering design of a complex system;
 Require them to follow an industry-recognised engineering development lifecycle (design, development, review and demonstration) against a demanding mission requirement;
 Provide an opportunity for students to develop and demonstrate team working, project management, manufacturing, leadership and commercial skills as well as technical competence;
 Provide an opportunity to demonstrate professionalism when exposed to real life flight safety considerations and live flight environments;
 Enhance employment opportunities in the sector;
 Stimulate interest in the civil UAS field;
 Foster inter-university collaboration in the UAS technology area, and to provide a forum for interdisciplinary research; and
 Enable students to interact with knowledgeable and experienced aerospace engineers on an aerospace project, through mentoring, webinars and feedback throughout the project.

September 2024

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Quiet Drones 2024 and drone noise considerations to prepare the future

It was an honour to participate in a panel discussion at Quiet Drones 2024 alongside industry leaders Marion Burgess, Joe Czech, Ed Weston (CAA), Jesse Suskin (Wings Australia), and Guillaume Malaval (EASA) on drone noise considerations.

Is drone noise and noise regulation a pressing issue today? Not really.

What about in the future?

For many data capture and aerial intelligence drone operations, noise may not be a significant concern either. Drone noise varies, if I am honest I regularly find their noise signature … annoying, however only the crew members and clients’ staff are typically nearby.

However, when we consider operations at scale in busy, populated areas—such as drone deliveries or urban transport where people are exposed to the noise regularly, perhaps even daily—noise becomes a different story. In these scenarios, being “quieter by design” will likely be a crucial success factor for market leaders. It won’t just be about meeting regulatory standards; it will be about developing a standout product that gains widespread acceptance and market traction.

ALS

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Protected: ARPAS-UK Response to CAA’s UK SORA consultation. MEMBERS ONLY

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Survey: FRZ or TOLA from private land: obtaining permission, charging, process efficiency

Thank you for helping us collect data on your experience over the last 12 months in terms of obtaining permissions to fly in a FRZ, or to take-off and land from private land. Primarily: did you get permission? Was it free and if not how much was it? How efficient was the process? Have you noticed an evolution over time?

The data will be processed anonymously, and findings will be bundled together as community responses.

 Please respond to our survey by clicking HERE.

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Is CAP2606 A, the PDRA01 logbook template, mandatory or optional?

Source: written exchange with CAA representative, July 2024

The logbook template provided in CAP2606 A is optional as long as operators continue to fulfil their obligations as per UK Reg (EU) 2019/947 UAS.SPEC.050.

Q: Among the 53 entries, can you specify which information is specifically required by the regulations in the flight log? In another log or records, like the flight preparation checklists, as part of the Operator’s obligation of record keeping? or is optional/not specifically required by the regulation?

Many of the 53 entries will be duplicated flight on flight, with a far smaller amount requiring specific entries. The information required will vary from Operator to Operator and flight to flight, hence, very difficult to provide further clarification.

Q: Many operators now use alternative digital means to capture flight data and records, such as Dronedesk, or Flight Reader, AirData, or Screencastomatic – much less time consuming than an excel sheet and in the end more transparent. Can you confirm these will be acceptable as a Means of Compliance?

The CAA teams are not currently able to integrate with other digital systems. However, they are aware that many will permit the export of data into a format that is currently acceptable for the CAA.

Did you read as well our article about CAP2606, the Operations manual template? Click here to read it.

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CAA announced the 6 new projects selected for BVLOS drone flight trials in the UK

Six projects have been selected for trials under a new UK Civil Aviation Authority scheme that will test drone use in deliveries, inspections of infrastructure, emergency services and flights to remote locations.

The regulator has chosen the trials to take place that will help safely integrate drones flying beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) of their operator into UK airspace, helping to make this vital extension to drone flying an everyday reality.

BVLOS flights will be carried out at distances beyond the flyer’s ability to see the drone. These flights use advanced technologies for navigation, control and to detect other aircraft.

The UK Civil Aviation Authority has selected the projects, including:

  • Amazon Prime Air; (consumer drone deliveries)
  • Airspection; (inspecting offshore windfarms)
  • National Police Air Service; (NPAS) (exploring uncrewed aircraft use in policing)
  • NATS; (BVLOS inspections over the North Sea)
  • Project SATE; (Sustainable Aviation Test Environment) (flights to Orkney)
  • Project Lifeline; (medical deliveries)

The trials will gather key safety data, such as how drones detect and avoid other aircraft, the electronic signals they can send to be able to be visible to other airspace users and air traffic control.

This will support the regulator’s ongoing development of policy and regulations so that drone flights can be fully integrated with other airspace users.

Sophie O’Sullivan, Director of Future of Flight at the UK Civil Aviation Authority, said:

“These innovative trials mark a significant step forward in integrating drones safely into UK airspace. By supporting projects ranging from consumer deliveries to critical infrastructure inspections, we are gathering essential data to shape future policies and regulations.

“Our goal is to make drone operations beyond visual line of sight a safe and everyday reality, contributing to the modernisation of UK airspace and the incorporation of new technology into our skies.”

The UK Civil Aviation Authority invited organisations to bid to participate in an innovation sandbox to validate and test their concepts, supporting the development of BVLOS capabilities.

Innovation sandboxes are controlled environments where organisations can test and further develop their new technology against the regulatory framework, helping applicants maximise the readiness of their innovation, and also help the UK Civil Aviation Authority better evolve regulations to better support both innovators and existing users.

The BVLOS sandbox is part of a collaboration with UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) that is supporting the creation of the aviation ecosystem needed to accelerate the introduction of advanced air mobility (AAM), drones, and electric sub-regional aircraft in the UK.

Simon Masters, Future Flight Challenge Deputy Director at UK Research and Innovation, said:

“The UKRI Future Flight challenge team are excited to be working in partnership with the UK Civil Aviation Authority, working together to accelerate the introduction of drone operations in the UK.

“These have the potential to transform how we deliver goods and provide services, particularly in less well-connected regions. These new sandbox projects are a great step towards realising these ambitions.”

The new trials will also help develop plans for how drones can be safely integrated with other airspace users, as part of the regulator’s wider Airspace Modernisation Strategy.

The projects included in the trial are:

Amazon Prime Air  

  • Prime Air is a delivery system from Amazon designed to safely get small packages to customers in less than an hour using drones.

Airspection

  • The Airspection – Scalable Offshore Wind Project aim to provide safe and reliable drone services for remote infrastructure. Accessing offshore wind turbines is currently a major challenge for the industry. Supported by a world leading offshore wind developer, this project aims to develop scalable Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) drone operations for offshore wind farms to enhance safety, reliability and environmental impact. The project will be trialled at an offshore wind farm and will serve as the foundation for remote drone services in this industry, reducing the need for vessels, minimising carbon emissions, and supporting the expansion of the UK offshore energy industry.

NPAS 

  • In 2021, the National Police Air Service established its Futures & Innovation Team. The team’s objectives were to investigate Beyond Visual Line of Sight capabilities and its potential adoption as part of a blended fleet.

    NPAS’s ambition is to fly an uncrewed aircraft, beyond visual line of sight, over a six month period, in an environment that is representative of where NPAS crewed aircraft would be tasked. It will look to test, and verify, not only the payload capabilities, which are identical to the performance of our crewed aircraft, but also validate the onboard DAA capabilities. This will allow NPAS to understand better what future air support capabilities it could adopt.

NATS 

  • NATS Services, aligned with the CAA’s Airspace Modernisation Strategy, is committed to working towards an airspace that’s safe and integrated for all users. In support of this ambition, we are delighted to be working with the CAA, Flylogix and wider partners to enable this pioneering project over the North Sea.
  • This is a chance for us to introduce and evaluate our early BVLOS approval services, something we hope will support and encourage the development of beyond visual line of sight drone operations across the UK.

Project SATE 

  • The Sustainable Aviation Test Environment (SATE) intends to develop a trial airspace test environment, the Trial Orkney Test Zone, and will test integrated manned and unmanned aircraft operations from Kirkwall Airport. The test zone will be specifically designed to enable a wide range of unmanned aircraft system (UAS) platforms to conduct Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) trials and operations in unsegregated Class G airspace. It will demonstrate the feasibility of operating a drone Hub-and-Spoke route network within unsegregated airspace based on integrated operations from Kirkwall airport (the hub) to the Orkney Island Council airfields and other use cases located across the Orkney archipelago.  
  • Consortium partner Highland and Islands Airports Ltd (HIAL) will lead the project in conjunction with fellow partner Windracers.  HIAL has a wealth of experience in airspace management, air traffic service provision and airport operations and Windracers bring extensive experience having operated their medium-lift long range Ultra drone in BVLOS trials in diverse environments.

Project Lifeline  

  • The LifeLine project is key to using drones for emergency medical services, delivering critical medical equipment—such as defibrillators (AEDs), EPI pens, and anti-bleeding kits—faster than ever before. The project also enhances first responders’ effectiveness by providing live camera feeds, which significantly improve situational awareness and decision-making during emergencies.
  • The initiative is driven by the expertise of Air Ambulance Charity KSS, Everdrone, Altitude Angel, NATS, and London Gatwick Airport, each contributing to the advancement of drone technology and airspace integration. The Everdrone system, already successfully utilized in live operations across Sweden, now brings its proven life-saving capabilities to the UK through these crucial trials.
  • Read the CAA post HERE.
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Protected: ARPAS-UK launches BVLOS SIG Manifesto and SIG Launch Event

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SkyLift announce the success of their most recent offshore heavy lift project with Ørsted

Over the course of just 10 flying days, SkyLift successfully delivered 5,460 kg of cargo to 94 wind turbines—an impressive 94 deliveries! In one day alone, they moved 1,150 kg of cargo. This achievement showcases the power of precision and teamwork.

The 70 kg drones – which have a wingspan of 2.6 m – can transport up to 100 kg of cargo and will help improve operational efficiency and safety while reducing carbon emissions from operating an offshore wind farm.

In this specific case, Orsted decided to update some critical evacuation and safety equipment in each of the wind turbines at the Dutch offshore wind farm. Normally, a vessel would sail from one wind turbine to the next, using several different cranes to lift each box to the top of the wind turbine. Instead, the drone simply flew back and forth from an offshore supply vessel directly to the top of the nacelle, allowing the company to update the equipment 10-15 times faster than normally.

This pioneering move marks a significant leap forward in operational efficiency and safety in the offshore wind industry.  The drone flight from the vessel to the turbine takes about four minutes per turbine, while the conventional approach without using drones can take approx. six hours. Taking vessel transport between the turbines and from-and-to shore into account, Ørsted has been able to complete the tasks at Borssele 10-15 times faster than normally.

Drones will reduce costs and time, improve operational safety and efficiency and will reduce carbon emissions due to fewer journeys by ship. This will all lead to further improve the commercial fundamentals of offshore wind for investors, governments, and corporations.

Read Moonrock’s interview with Harry Getliffe, COO of SkyLift.

Both SkyLift and Moonrock Drone Insurance are ARPAS-UK Members

21 August 2024

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Tips: CAP2606 PDRA01 Ops Manual template is a proposed AMC, is it mandatory or optional?

Source: written exchange with CAA representative, July 2024

CAP2606 is a suggested format for a PDRA01 Operations Manual Template, but optional, the CAA do suggest operators use the provided template as it provides Operators with an easy-to-use method of complying with the regulations set out in CAP722H.

Q: Can operators continue to use and update their existing PDRA01 Operations Manual, reflecting as need be the CAP2606 recommendations?

Operators can continue to use and update their existing Operations Manual as long as they continue to fulfil their obligations as per UK Reg (EU) 2019/947 UAS.SPEC.050.

Note from ARPAS-UK: CAP2606 Ops Manual template is a proposed means of compliance to the operator’s obligation as per UK Reg (EU) 2019/947 UAS.SPEC.050 “Responsibilities of the UAS operator”. It is comprehensive, and in a way takes the Operator’s professionalism to an “OSC-ready” level since the underlying assumption is the maximum risk level under PDRA01. Many operators likely operate at the other end of the PDRA01 spectrum, where simpler Operations Manual and checklists could be sufficient.

Q: Will the CAA issue a guidance document to highlight the required info for those who will keep their existing Vol1?

Currently the CAA does not intend to issue further guidance for ad-hoc Operation Manual types, instead recommending that Operators move to the template suggested in CAP2606.