The United States has an historic opportunity to influence the safe integration of civil unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) into its National Airspace System (NAS) by implementing a safety management system (SMS) for UAS operators now — before the full UAS integration into the NAS. We also recommend adoption of the term remotely operated aircraft to replace unmanned aerial vehicle, but in this article have retained the older term from the U.S. strategic roadmap.
The advantages of such an SMS strategy are overwhelming and persuasive. Paramount is the opportunity to amend the regulatory framework based on actual hazard data derived from day-to-day developments within UAS operations.
The circumstances are perfect. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is granting authorization for six test sites and accompanying airspace for the development of UAS technologies (see “UAS Sites,” p. 9). This will prove a boon for the developing civil UAS technology companies….
