The Commercial Unmanned Aircraft Association of Southern Africa (CUAASA) will be hosting an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) conference in Centurion next week focusing on the challenges of implementing South Africa’s new UAV regulations.
CUAASA said it would launch its UAV registration workshop with a call for fair and reasonable implementation of UAV regulations from the Minister of Transport and the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
“Over 60 of South Africa’s leading companies that utilise Remotely Piloted Aircraft System (RPAS) technology will attend the workshop aimed at assisting members to comply with proposed Part 101 regulation prescribed by the CAA. Part 101, applicable to RPAS will come into law on 1 July 2015.
“CUAASA will call on the Minister to ensure that the new regulations do not effectively kill this industry – capable of creating jobs and even delivering better government services, before it takes off,” the Association said.
The conference starts on 10 June at The Success Academy – Oxford Business Park and ends on 13 June. Some of the speakers that are scheduled to attend include the Minister of Transport or Poppy Khoza, Leon Dillman (CEO of the Commercial Aircraft Association of South Africa – CAASA), Shadrack Ramosa (President of CAASA), John Wesley (Council for Scientific and Industrial Research), Colette Van Zyl (Van Zyl Aviation) and Johan Beumer (Promaneng), amongst others.
South Africa, is, as far as can be ascertained, one of the first countries in the world which has prescribed regulations for UAVs that will include beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) and night flights.
“In the absence of guiding documents from ICAO (International Civil Aviation Organisation) regulators such as ourselves have had to derive measures to address the regulation deficiency in response to growing demand,” Poppy Khoza, Director Of Civil Aviation at the SA Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) said last month.
“SACAA took into account national safety and security needs. We also took into account the work done by ICAO thus far and what is likely to be an international position and customised it into local regulations, taking into account our own conditions.”
“In developing the regulations, the SACAA sourced and received valuable input from relevant state entities as well as industry role players including operators, manufactures and other airspace users,” she said.
As from July people operating UAVs have to be in possession of a SACAA approved and valid remote pilot licence and a letter of approval to operate a UAV. To ensure accountability from providers and marketers of UAVs, sellers have to make purchasers aware of SACAA criteria.
As far as UAV operators (pilots) are concerned, she noted a valid remote pilot licence was a necessity, but did not elaborate on licence acquisition details.
“We are not claiming these regulations are static. Given the pace of technological development in this area we treat the RPAs regulation framework as a continual work in progress. We will continue to engage with industry to refine them when, where and as necessary,” Khoza said.
The regulations only apply to operators who wish to fly their UAVs for commercial purposes.
