The FAA announced Tuesday that more than a half million drones have been registered by hobbyists with its agency in the past eight month, according to its administrator speaking at a White House gathering.
Michael Huerta, administrator for the Federal Aviation Administration, made the comments during the first-ever Workshop on Drones and the Future of Aviation sponsored by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/photos-and-video/video/2016/08/02/otsp-workshop-drones-and-future-aviation
The workshop brought together experts and researchers across industry, academia, and government to talk about various topics areas related to policy, research and development, and the technology of unmanned aircraft systems, according to a statement on the White House website.
The FAA announced in January that it had begun registration for hobbyists using drones, where users would receive a Certificate of Aircraft Registration/Proof of Ownership, which includes a unique identification number that also has to be marked on the aircraft.
https://www.faa.gov/news/updates/?newsId=84386
Huerta said in prepared remarks Tuesday that after developing recommendations with an industry task force, the FAA has had a robust registration response.
http://www.faa.gov/news/speeches/news_story.cfm?newsId=20594
"But by working together, we got it done – and we've registered more than 500,000 hobbyists in eight months," Huerta said, according to his prepared remarks posted on the FAA website. "To put that in perspective, we only have 320,000 registered manned aircraft – and it took us 100 years to get there."
Huerta said in his statement that the registration has allowed the FAA to link particular drones with their operators when users are not following rules and assists in enforcement of the unmanned vehicles.
"It also gives us a valuable opportunity to educate users about how to fly their unmanned aircraft safely," Huerta said in his remarks. "We're encouraging operators to download our free smartphone app, B4UFLY, which lets you know where it's safe and legal to fly a drone. It's available for both Apple and Android devices, and it's already been downloaded more than 85,000 times.
"… In addition to educating hobbyists, we're putting a regulatory framework in place to address the commercial use of drones as well," Huerta added.
The White House announced new initiatives Tuesday to increase the use of drones by businesses, allowing companies to use drones for chores like taking aerial photos of crops and inspecting power lines, according to Fortune magazine.
http://fortune.com/2016/08/02/white-house-alphabet-drone-delivery-google/
The White House said that an experimental drone delivery program by Google's parent company, Alphabet, would conduct a research study at one of the FAA's six approved drone testing sites as part of its initiative, noted the magazine. The research program is examining the integration of large-scale drone delivery services into commercial airspace, noted Fortune.
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