With drones becoming ever-cheaper and proliferating, the Federal Aviation Administration is finally moving on rules to regulate their use. Although many believe the proposed rules go too far, there is broad agreement that some rules are necessary.
Unlike some other activities — many of which are over-regulated — the flying of manned and unmanned vehicles carries enormous risks both for operators and for anyone in their vicinity.
More to the point, neither air nor road traffic can remain useful without established and broadly accepted rules that all operators know to obey. Just imagine: If a substantial number of drivers simply decided to ignore traffic signals from now on, it would make travel impossible because it would be too dangerous. Likewise, the rules of the air provide a common framework of conventions and procedures from which all operators work, without which aviation would be impossible.
But the FAA has long had a blind spot in this regard when it comes to gliders — fixed-wing aircraft without engines that thousands of Americans enjoy flying for sport. Despite longstanding recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board, the FAA has consistently resisted requiring gliders to carry equipment that could alert other aircraft or air traffic controllers of their presence. Rather, gliders operate under what is known as visual flight rules, whereby pilots moving at hundreds of miles per hour are supposed to spot them in time to avoid an accident.
This visual system doesn’t always work. In British Columbia last June, a couple piloting a Cessna with their dog collided with a glider carrying two people – all four people and the dog were killed. And this is not as rare an event as one would hope. There have been at least two dozen near-misses and collisions between gliders and small planes in the United States in the last 16 years.
There was a time when transponders were weighty, energy-devouring devices that placed a huge burden on glider pilots. This has changed as the devices have become lighter and less power-intensive. That’s why, as the FAA begins setting foot in the relatively new area of drone regulation, it must not ignore the more traditional threats it was established to prevent.
Air travel is a huge boon to humanity, providing unprecedented mobility. It is also a very risky business in which small mistakes can cost lives. With the technology available to mitigate risks easily, the FAA should revisit the 2008 recommendation from the NTSB and put it into effect, requiring gliders to carry equipment that help prevent collisions in the future.
