OK so the “Drone enquiry” on Parliament TV a few days back… I finally watched the last 1.25 hours (I was a bit late on the record button)
What I seemed to pick up from the enquiry was that the people running the enquiry were completely clueless and had no idea what drones are really capable of…
Given the gravity of drones, the chairman / panel could have done with spending:
- a day with a DJI flier
- 2 days with a DIY drone builder/ flier
- a day with a toy drone flier
- a day with a racing drone builder/ flier
- a day with an RC plane, glider and helicopter pilot
Then he/they may have been better equipped to ask questions.
The panel seemed blinkered to DJI drones and seemed to think that all the DJI measures or safety like geo-fencing etc could be in every drone!
Of course then there were the questions of DJI security as they manufacture while under Chinese law. This gives the Chinese government the right to access any information held by DJI in China (flight logs etc). So the use of DJI drones for government, forces and national security use was in question.
There was no advanced hobbyist there. If the BMFA were there then I missed that part.
Sadly the panel were like the guys at Chernobyl who had no idea how a nuclear power station actually worked. Our government who are making law and policy on the back of unsubstantiated and possible manufactured incidents (Gatwick) are clueless.
The only good thing that I could see during the enquiry was that some of the experts representing the drone community were questioning the CAA’s drone registration fee and advising to make it free or very low cost.