Registration for drone on USA holiday

[StevenPSCC]

hello all, I will be visiting the USA (Miami, Frt Lauderdale) Do I have to register my drone with the FAA to fly in Florida if I'm not a US citizen ?
Thanks

 

[Rbruz]

hello all, I will be visiting the USA (Miami, Frt Lauderdale) Do I have to register my drone with the FAA to fly in Florida if I'm not a US citizen ?
Thanks

No

 

[msinger]

Currently, hobbyists no longer have to register in the US to fly. See more details on the FAA's website here.

 

[BigBoozer]

How do you US folks deal now with the Paragraph C2 of the 336 Section (below), in general?

(c) MODEL AIRCRAFT DEFINED... [omissis]
(2) flown within visual line of sight of the person operating the aircraft;

Should anyone be caught flying BLOS is he not anymore covered by Sec. 336 and is he considered guilty of not having registered with the FAA?
Heck, this bird goes BLOS after 200-300 meters (1,000 feet) - if you have really good eyes!

 

[StevenPSCC]

Thanks for the replys, I was under the impression that Florida had more of a strict policy than other states.

 

[Maxheadspace]

Thanks for the replys, I was under the impression that Florida had more of a strict policy than other states.

The FAA regulates things in the air, the States (e.g., Florida) regulate the ground. So States may be able to control where you take off and land, but they cannot control how and where you fly. What I do when traveling around the US is I go to the city's official web site and search for "drone", "UAS", and "sUAS", to see if they have drone restrictions. All US National Parks prohibit drone flying, and the Everglades National Park is a major part of the area around Miami and Ft Lauderdale, so beware of the Everglades. State Parks often restrict flying as well. I think Miami and Ft Lauderdale are relatively drone-friendly, as opposed to the Los Angeles, California area which is a minefield of drone restrictions. There are a number of Mavic flyers who post photos and videos from southern Florida on this site. I don't think you'll have an issue in Florida.

Miami: City of Miami - Official Website

Miami Beach: City of Miami Beach - Official Website

Miami-Dade County: http://www.miamidade.gov/

Ft. Lauderdale: City of Fort Lauderdale, FL : Home

 

[Zoro]

How do you US folks deal now with the Paragraph C2 of the 336 Section (below), in general?

(c) MODEL AIRCRAFT DEFINED... [omissis]
(2) flown within visual line of sight of the person operating the aircraft;

Should anyone be caught flying BLOS is he not anymore covered by Sec. 336 and is he considered guilty of not having registered with the FAA?
Heck, this bird goes BLOS after 200-300 meters (1,000 feet) - if you have really good eyes!

Maybe a pair of binoculars would help.

 

[MAVICPILOT13]

How can someone prove what I could or could not see at any given moment in time. The rule doesn't have any specifics about the type of line of sight I must maintain (it doesn't say "unassisted" or else those with glasses would get hurt... in fact, it welcomes the use of a "spotter" if I fly POV, so why not a telescope for example?), so if push came to shove that leaves a lot of room for loopholes. Until they start clamping down on the LOS rule, its probably a non-issue. If someone does something bad BLOS, they will still have a chance to defend themselves anyway, and it will be a difficult (if not impossible) thing to prove under the current vague rule. So far has anyone been successfully fined for flying BLOS? I'm not aware of anyone, and would be shocked if there was.

 

[Zoro]

How can someone prove what I could or could not see at any given moment in time. The rule doesn't have any specifics about the type of line of sight I must maintain (it doesn't say "unassisted" or else those with glasses would get hurt... in fact, it welcomes the use of a "spotter" if I fly POV, so why not a telescope for example?), so if push came to shove that leaves a lot of room for loopholes. Until they start clamping down on the LOS rule, its probably a non-issue. If someone does something bad BLOS, they will still have a chance to defend themselves anyway, and it will be a difficult (if not impossible) thing to prove under the current vague rule. So far has anyone been successfully fined for flying BLOS? I'm not aware of anyone, and would be shocked if there was.

The only thing I could see is if the drone went over a hill top, but still close. I had that experience flying out in the desert where it flew over a hill, I could still hear it but couldn't see it.

 

[FlyGuy8675309]

Florida does indeed have some more stringent laws on the books - most of it is common sense but you can easily run afoul of some of the rules: Nice outline is at:
Florida Drone Laws (2017) -

 

[StevenPSCC]

Florida does indeed have some more stringent laws on the books - most of it is common sense but you can easily run afoul of some of the rules: Nice outline is at:
Florida Drone Laws (2017) -

Thanks for that

 

[StevenPSCC]

Thanks for the links

 

[StevenPSCC]

The FAA regulates things in the air, the States (e.g., Florida) regulate the ground. So States may be able to control where you take off and land, but they cannot control how and where you fly. What I do when traveling around the US is I go to the city's official web site and search for "drone", "UAS", and "sUAS", to see if they have drone restrictions. All US National Parks prohibit drone flying, and the Everglades National Park is a major part of the area around Miami and Ft Lauderdale, so beware of the Everglades. State Parks often restrict flying as well. I think Miami and Ft Lauderdale are relatively drone-friendly, as opposed to the Los Angeles, California area which is a minefield of drone restrictions. There are a number of Mavic flyers who post photos and videos from southern Florida on this site. I don't think you'll have an issue in Florida.

Miami: City of Miami - Official Website

Miami Beach: City of Miami Beach - Official Website

Miami-Dade County: http://www.miamidade.gov/

Ft. Lauderdale: City of Fort Lauderdale, FL : Home

Thanks hats helpful

 

[MAVICPILOT13]

The only thing I could see is if the drone went over a hill top, but still close. I had that experience flying out in the desert where it flew over a hill, I could still hear it but couldn't see it.

Agreed, but could you prove I couldn't see it. How?

If the rule said "UAV cannot leave unassisted line of sight, and if the pilot is observed by enforcement as breaking this rule, we will give ultimate authority to the officer in deciding if it has" then fine, but if they ever try to fine me based on the current rule they are going to have a HECK of a time trying to prove it... Its a poorly written rule (at least when it comes to being able to enforce it), because it relies entirely on what the PILOT can see LOS, and until they can jack into my optics, good luck with that!!!

 

[BigBoozer]

Maybe a pair of binoculars would help.

Sure. A 100x telescope works even better... if you can keep sight of a moving drone with it.
Holding a binocular while you have two hands busy on a RC is not an option, and spotting half square foot of a gray Mavic on the background of a thick wood (I do not want on purpose to speak of a background of a skyline of buildings, because that should be forbidden... right?) is very, very difficult even with a binocular. Unless you hire a good spotter and give him the task of not loosing sight of your Mavic. But at that point you still are not flying within LOS. The spotter has LOS, not you... which brings me back to square one:
Should anyone be caught by a law enforcing agent (whoever) flying a drone BLOS is he not anymore covered by Sec. 336 and is he considered guilty of not having registered with the FAA?

 

[MAVICPILOT13]

Sure. A 100x telescope works even better... if you can keep sight of a moving drone with it.
Holding a binocular while you have two hands busy on a RC is not an option, and spotting half square foot of a gray Mavic on the background of a thick wood (I do not want on purpose to speak of a background of a skyline of buildings, because that should be forbidden... right?) is very, very difficult even with a binocular. Unless you hire a good spotter and give him the task of not loosing sight of your Mavic. But at that point you still are not flying within LOS. The spotter has LOS, not you... which brings me back to square one:
Should anyone be caught by a law enforcing agent (whoever) flying a drone BLOS is he not anymore covered by Sec. 336 and is he considered guilty of not having registered with the FAA?

How would anyone be caught flying BLOS? When did LE (or anyone) gain the ability to see what I could see LOS? Maybe I could, maybe I couldn't, but can you PROVE I was BLOS at the time you "caught" me? How???

This is the trouble with subjective regulations like this. It's like saying only "grey" drones are allowed to fly. Would that mean the entire body has to be grey? The fuselage? Propellers? What if it was built by a company called "Grey"? If I flew a P3 under that "regulation" could you prove that it wasn't "grey"? What about the pads on the landing gear?

When you aren't extremely specific with "regulations", you can't enforce them on anything but the ignorant. That seems to be enough for the FAA.

I can't WAIT to see someone get "caught" flying BLOS and actually fight it. To my knowledge, it has yet to happen...

 

[BigBoozer]

How would anyone be caught flying BLOS? When did LE (or anyone) gain the ability to see what I could see LOS? Maybe I could, maybe I couldn't, but can you PROVE I was BLOS at the time you "caught" me? How???

I was flying last month a plain flight in a park, LOS, slow, no sweat.
A chap comes by, interested in the drone, very friendly approach, mid thirties. I show him the vision from the tablet, the distance from the bird, some manouvers, everything. Then he says he's local police, in plaincloth duty. Fortunately he was sincerely interested in my Mavic, not in checking me for doing something wrong. If I was flying BLOS or over the local summer school full of kids or whatever else, he could have plainly crucifixed me. He saw the whole thing... isn't that enough to prove a possible "crime" ?

 

[EarlieP]

when they say where is it just say over there and generally finger point in the right direction, they will probably say i can't see it. How do they know you can't see it. Unless of course you show them that you are flying over a town 4 miles away in which case you can't complain if you are caught!

 

[Maxheadspace]

Florida does indeed have some more stringent laws on the books - most of it is common sense but you can easily run afoul of some of the rules: Nice outline is at:
Florida Drone Laws (2017) -

Or maybe not so common sense. I don't think I would ever suspect that flying over a rubber storage location would pose an illegal threat to critical infrastructure! The one positive aspect of the Florida legislation is that the State prohibits subordinate (local) governments from regulating drones in any way.