What the FAA's New Drone Rules Mean for Everyone

After more than five years of handwringing, missed deadlines, and court cases, the Federal Aviation Administration has finally provided a path forward for the legal use of drones in the United States.

​The news dropped Sunday morning, so there's a good chance you've already heard a bit about the new proposed regulations. Commercial drones must stay within line of sight of the operator, must fly during daylight hours, must stay at speeds below 100 miles per hour and altitudes of less than 500 feet, and must not fly above people who are uninvolved with the flight.

Overall, it's a major win for the commercial drone industry, especially considering that rules being floated and rumored over the last several months were much more strict—one report suggested that drone operators would have to be ​licensed private pilots in order to get their foot in the door, in fact. Drone pilots I know are over-the-moon that the FAA seems to have finally seen the light on this technology, especially after years of legal battles and threats that have come from the agency for businesses that have operated in a legal grey area.

Here's what we can take away and reasonably infer from the FAA's document:

What you're looking at is probably the final rule

Drone pilots and the drone industry are pretty ecstatic with what the FAA has put out there. There are some sticking points: Experienced pilots want to fly over processions and people for photography purposes (a concert shot with drone footage, for instance). But, overall, from the industry side, people are happy with this. I wouldn't expect a lot of pushback or comments asking the FAA for even wider latitude to fly.

I also wouldn't expect a ton of pushback coming from those wanting to limit drones. There are privacy advocates who fear camera-wielding drones will prove intrusive, and want to keep them grounded, and they have a point. But right now, there's so much money and momentum pushing drones forward that it seems likely privacy will be tackled by some other entity or at a later date. The only other real opposition drones have had has come from crop dusting pilots, who argue that a drone-crop duster crash would be catastrophic. They're not wrong, but that argument comes from a fear of losing their jobs more than anything else, and the agricultural pilot lobby simply isn't a very strong voice.

Delivery drones are not dead

​One of the biggest misconceptions going around right now is that Amazon's delivery drones are now DOA. It's true that delivery drones aren't going to be legal under this rule, but this is the first of many drone regulations that will eventually come out. The FAA wasn't ready to tackle flying outside the line of sight or with drones that drop things, which seems pretty sensible. FAA administrator Michael Huerta has noted that the FAA will continue researching delivery drones. So, not yet, but to say that delivery drones are never going to happen is shortsighted.

Many of the lawsuits against the FAA will probably go away

Three separate groups—model aircraft pilots, drone business owners, and a group of universities—​filed suit against the FAA last summer after the agency made it more difficult to fly drones legally. Brendan Schulman, the lawyer representing the firms, would not tell me more about ongoing litigation (understandably so).

However, it seems like a safe bet that drone businesses will drop their suit, considering all they were really asking for was a way to fly legally. The Academy of Model Aeronautics was angry that model aircraft, which have never been regulated, were being lumped in with more stringent commercial drone rules. The FAA's actual rule, however, lets model aircraft flyers continue as they always have. The AMA seemed pleased in an emailed press release: "The preliminary information released today indicates that the proposed regulation will treat the recreational use of small unmanned aircraft separately from that of commercial use," it said.

University researchers are probably not pleased

Schulman's last group of FAA-suing clients, however, a group of drone-using universities, can't be happy about the ruling. "Research and development" and "educational and academic uses" are classified as commercial uses of drones subject to new regulations. Schulman tweeted that provision would be a "huge blow" to existing research programs. Universities are clients of his, so I would expect that lawsuit to move forward.

Huge blow as existing university robotics and engineering programs captured by proposed FAA sUAS drone rules. pic.twitter.com/RZxma84Yz1

— Brendan Schulman (@dronelaws) February 15, 2015

The FAA has done everything slowly with drones. There will be a comment period of 60 days before the FAA actually votes on a final set of rules, and I wouldn't be surprised if the process somehow drags for months before they're ultimately finalized. The FAA will also have to beef up its air traffic control staffing (it requires drone operators to call control towers before flying anywhere remotely near an airport) and its drone licensing and testing sites. This process isn't over, not by a longshot. But now, finally, there appears to be light at the end of the tunnel.