Unmanned Vehicles

A California company is taking a novel approach to autonomous aviation by making human pilots an integral part of its development. While many of the more advanced drone hopefuls have created elaborate clean-sheet designs, San Francisco startup Xwing is heaping new technology into a proven design with room for a human to act as pilot […]

The Department of Justice (DOJ), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Federal Communications Commission (FCC) have issued a joint advisory designed to clarify federal laws and regulations potentially applicable to “the use of capabilities to detect and mitigate threats posed by Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) operations.” The “Advisory on the Application […]

The town of Buena Vista, Colorado, unanimously approved a concept for an unmanned aircraft systems (UAS/drone) flying park on Tuesday. The drone park will be divided into four zones based on activity with areas for basic training, qualification operations, obstacle navigation and racing events. The proposal was put forward by the Central Colorado UAS Club. […]

China-based EHang introduced a version of its EHang 216 autonomous aerial vehicle (AAV) last week designed to operate as an aerial firefighting solution. The company says its 216F AAV is specifically targeted at high-rise firefighting, aiming to address issues such as the insufficient height of fire rescue ladders, reach of fire nozzles and potential for […]

An opinion writer for Forbes has postulated that the future of the pilot trade is just that, “semi-professional” monitors of autonomous machines that actually discourage human intervention because we are so sloppy. In a column, Paul Kennard says humans are too imprecise to get the best performance and longevity out of aircraft systems and cost […]

The FAA had no idea who was flying swarms of drones over Colorado and Nebraska around the New Year and still doesn’t according to documents obtained through a Freedom of Information request filed by a group that normally investigates UFO sightings. The Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies unearthed emails and documents from the FAA, including […]

The drone industry is fond of saying that its influence will be felt in every aspect of human endeavor and now it’s managed to replace the chirping of birds and babble of your favorite brook with buzz of four little rotors. The Swellpro Splashdrone 3+ promises to take all the guesswork, much less exercise, out […]

The NTSB says it’s pretty sure a news helicopter hit a drone over downtown Los Angeles last December, causing minor damage to the helicopter, which made a safe precautionary landing. There was a pilot and two passengers onboard the Airbus AS-350, which was operating as an electronic news gathering helicopter for the local ABC affiliate […]

An Israeli company says its new Bonanza-sized drone can mix it up safely with regular civilian air traffic thanks to a triple redundant detect-and-avoid system to keep out of the way. The StarLiner from Elbit Systems is compliant with NATO’s Standardization Agreement known as STANAG 4671, meaning it is approved for missions where airliners and […]

Transport Canada is proposing to allow drones weighing as much as a Cessna 152 to be operated beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) in what it classifies as “isolated areas” and to liberalize drone operations across the board. The proposals are being opposed by major aviation groups in Canada as a threat to manned aircraft […]