Earlier this year, the FAA had announced it would be creating a Special Federal Aviation Regulation designed to provide a systematic approach for regular access to parts of the NAS for sUAS — primarily focusing on commercial applications. The current process requires that requests to operate UAS in the national airspace be reviewed on a case-by-case basis through either a certificate of waiver or authorization or special airworthiness certificate, experimental category process. However, due to the nature of these processes and the temporary authorizations that result, neither could support the routine access of UAS to the national airspace. These processes also made the development and use of UAS for civil applications expensive and difficult to pursue, thus severely restricting the potential growth of the UAS industry.

The FAA issued a request for information, invoking Public Law 104-113, National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act, which states government agencies should use private sector SDOs and commercial standards whenever possible. Therefore, rather than codifying all aspects of sUAS operation and airworthiness in the SFAR, the FAA can accelerate the process and involve industry, government and academic experts to develop the consensus standards for addressing significant portions of the practices, methods, specifications and procedures that will be needed.

“ASTM International is proud to support the FAA in this groundbreaking effort to open up a new and significant market for the future of aviation in the United States as well as the rest of the world,” says Katharine Morgan, vice president of ASTM Technical Committee Operations. “We know of numerous government agencies as well as private sector companies that are looking forward to the day when they can take advantage of the capabilities of unmanned aircraft systems to save lives, conduct research and grow the economy.”

To kick off this effort, F38 will hold a meeting in Arlington, Va., on Feb. 17-18. For more information on this meeting and F38, visit the F38 home page at www.astm.org/uav.htm. ASTM International welcomes and encourages participation in the development of its standards. For more information on becoming an ASTM member, visit www.astm.org/JOIN.

Technical Contact: James Jewell, UAV MarketSpace Inc., Bath, Pa., Phone: 610-910-4029; james@uavm.com

ASTM Staff Contact: Daniel Schultz, Phone: 610-832-9716; dschultz@astm.org