Drone safety during the US Drone Racing Open

While there are no laws currently regarding the use of drones we do have some safety standards that have been spottily enforced. Legislation will be made shortly however not in time for the USDR league open races. These drone races will happen in over 1000 villages across the country between August First and the Third and we ask that the below safety precautions are followed.

1. Keep your drone within visual line of sight or have a secondary spotter near it at all times unless you are flying in a unpopulated nature reserve using a FPV camera.

2. Never fly above 500ft unless you have contacted your nearest ATC facility for high altitude drone clearance. You can also electronically request such clearance using the Automated Drone Air Traffic Control Portal (ADATCP) on MyAmericanas. Once you have a clearance obey it’s instructions exactly as written. No recreational drone will ever be cleared above 1500 feet.

3. DO NOT FLY NEAR AIRPORTS! You must remain at least one mile away from an airport unless you are within the airports drone observation area and have a valid observer frequency tag. DO NOT ENTER THE OBSERVER AREA UNLESS YOU HAVE A FREQUENCY TAG OR ARE NOT FLYING A DRONE. UNAUTHORIZED DRONES WITHOUT FREQUENCY TAGS WILL RESULT IN THE USER BEING FINED!

4. Before flying over large populated buildings such as stadiums you must contact the owners for authorization and have an appropriate frequency tag issued by the owner. Flight over all US Baseball League stadiums is allowed with written consent. To acquire consent simply call the stadium front desk and ask for the media relations office. Please note that due to the high volume of people with drones wanting to experience the ball parks that wait lists are in effect. If you are seeking to observe a specific game using your drone they will make every effort to accommodate you. Also please note that footage of baseball games captured by a recreational drone may not be rebroadcast in entirety, still images may be pulled from the recording and used on social media. Short video clips under three minutes in length may be used on social media.

Upon completion of the legislation MOST DRONES must be registered with DATS (Department of Aviation and Transport Safety) there will be no fee for registering your drone and you will receive free benefits including free loss & theft recovery assistance, free or low cost drone insurance, free or low cost Professional Drone Pilot license education and testing, free entry to all drone observation areas (capacity limits apply)

Few drones will be exempt from registration, particularly drones that are only used indoors and drones that are only used on a persons private property under the 100ft private airspace ceiling. We strongly suggest these drones be registered anyway to take advantage of higher altitudes outside and the free benefits that registration offers.

Press Release prepared by Laura De-Eisman