[新聞] U.S. Domestic Test Sites for Drone Aircraft

[chataulait (死貓一隻)]

記得當初阿嬤宋CEO 宣布準備用drone 送貨的時候
FAA 立即的反應是立刻否認
沒想到才沒過多久...

http://tinyurl.com/lxevf2y


U.S. Names Domestic Test Sites for Drone Aircraft


WASHINGTON — The Federal Aviation Administration will authorize test
sites for drone aircraft in upstate New York, New Jersey and seven other
states, the agency said on Monday, but integrating the aircraft into the
nation’s airspace, set by Congress for 2015, will be phased in gradually.

The agency picked six institutions to operate test locations, which will
explore how to set safety standards, how to train and certify their
ground-based pilots, how to ensure that the aircraft will operate safely
even if they lose their radio links with the ground and, most of all,
how to replace the traditional method for avoiding collisions.

Already, federal investigators have linked one drone craft to a problem
that would have been almost inconceivable if a pilot had been on board:
The engine failed, and no one noticed.

While the public is mostly aware of drones like Predators, Global Hawks
and other high-altitude, long-range planes operated by the government,
Monday’s announcement covers commercial and private aircraft that come
in a variety of shapes and sizes.

These include electric helicopters that a landlord could use to inspect
a rooftop water tower; midget helicopters that a utility line worker
starts by yanking a cord like the one on a chain saw, which can fly
close to power lines; and Styrofoam planes that run on lighter fluid
and can fly over fields to look for agricultural pests. Police and fire
departments are among those eager to operate drones.

Competition to host the test sites was fierce, with state economic
development agencies predicting that a major industry was developing.

The six winners, chosen from a field of 25, included Griffiss International
Airport, a former Air Force base near Rome, N.Y., and Virginia Tech,
which will fly in Virginia and has an agreement with Rutgers University
in New Jersey for testing there as well. Virginia Tech plans to conduct
“failure mode” testing, meaning what happens if the aircraft’s control
link is lost.

The others were the University of Alaska, which plans to test in Hawaii
and Oregon as well as Alaska, the State of Nevada, the North Dakota
Department of Commerce, and Texas A&M University Corpus Christi. Michael
P. Huerta, the administrator of the F.A.A., said the sites provided a
diversity of geography, climate and air traffic density.

Mr. Huerta said the choice of the six institutions is a major milestone
for the aircraft, whose proponents prefer to call them “unmanned aerial
systems.” But he said that while a 2012 law sets 2015 as the date by
which they would be integrated into an airspace shared with conventional
airplanes, “we would envision that that would be a staged process, as
we learn more about what these aircraft are, and how they interact with
other aircraft.”

The phase-in could be by type of drone, or by type of airspace, or some
other factor. The research will continue until 2017, the F.A.A. said.

Flights are supposed to begin within six months. The F.A.A. did not give
the exact locations where the tests would be carried out.

The basic concept is that everything in the sky, manned or not, will
use the Global Positioning System to determine its location in three
dimensions, and will radio that information to the ground, where a
computer will develop an integrated picture and send that to all pilots.
Sophisticated drones could use that data without human intervention to
sense conflicts with other aircraft.

Mr. Huerta said that his agency had already issued the first commercial
license for drone use; in Alaska it gave ConocoPhillips, the oil company,
permission to use a ScanEagle off the Alaska coast. The United States
uses the ScanEagle as a spy plane; Iran claims to have captured one and
copied its design.

The F.A.A. has put several privacy requirements in place for the test
program. Test site operators will be required to publish privacy policies,
covering how they will use the data they gather and how long they will
retain it, among other steps.


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→ ndr:感覺沒錯啊? test site也還沒出來,怎能說已經準備宋貨了
→ chataulait:Amazon 本來就說還要等好一陣子，結果當時被FAA打槍
→ chataulait:印象中Bezos 在專訪裡是說最快要2015才有可能開始
→ chataulait:然後記者去問FAA 得到的答案是不考慮開放
推 cses87241:不過台灣好像還沒有大學有跟航空公司合作研究?