VLOS or 500m flight limit?

I don’t think anyone reasonable person would expect a drone pilot to not look at the screens. Pilots of any commercial aircraft, large or small are expected to look at the controls.
However you would expect the pilot to look mostly out of the cockpit windscreen.

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Going to chuck this one into the mix too… what do you consider VLOS? “I can see a dot/flashing light in the sky over there”, or “I can see my drone well enough to know which way it’s facing”?

Personally, I’m in the latter camp.

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Meanwhile in the real world, flights out to film cruise ships etc with a mini2 :nerd_face: definitely must have good eyesight to stay within VLOS :thinking:

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Totally illegal and an immature approach! You MUST fly by VLOS, either unaided or via a spotter/observer. @Grazuncle and @JoeC summed up the reasons why we obey the regs perfectly.

Seems to me that this poster is simply looking to cause issues as he only joined the forum 6 hours ago. Over to you Mods!

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CAP 722 Edition 8 page 169:
A1.1.1 Type of operation
VLOS only, but a single ‘unmanned aircraft observer’ may be used as follows:
• The remote pilot is still responsible for the safety of the flight.
• the unmanned aircraft observer must be positioned next to the remote
pilot and they must be able to communicate clearly and effectively with
each other.
• the unmanned aircraft must be in the VLOS of the unmanned observer
at all times.

“68years old, retired police officer” Should know better :rofl:

That’s a great euphemism for, ‘as thick as two short planks’

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The reason fir VLOS is all about using the orientation of the aircraft to decide how the controls can be used in a way to prevent collision. That is not about seeing it just at distance. If the handling pilot cannot see which way the aircraft is flying then the correct control cannot be made to avoid a collision. So VLOS has two actions by the pilot and not one. Practically there is no way a Mavic Mini 2 can be seen at 500m and know how it is orientated to avoid collision. Normally this should be restricted to about 200m. People who don’t understand what the CAA want us to achieve will always be flying poorly and outside of the law.

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One of the exercises I had to do in the GVC practical, was to fly it 500 metres away and barely visible just over some trees, and bring it back manually. This showing you’d still got the orientation of the drone correct at that distance, not easy even with the M2Z which is twice the size of the M2 (and I’d got a strobe on the back to help).

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I believe one way to orientate yourself is to roll to right or left and see which way the aircraft moves. If it doesn’t appear to move left or right then the aircraft is at right angles to you - try a forwards or back to see whether it goes left or right!

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Correct. The most important part was that it was just barely visible (I mean BARELY visible) with the leaves on the tree making it even worse.

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OR

Surreptitiously press the RTH button …

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The original Drone Code stipulated for VLOS that you had to be able to see your drone at all times including orientation and proximity to any objects. A white Phantom 4 Pro at 200ft is near on impossible to see. I can only go on my experiences over the last 7 years. It’s worked for me and I’ve never had any problems or “near misses”.

The examiner is standing over your shoulder watching everything you do!

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That would have been a hard no from me. In your shoes I’d have taken it as far as I was still able to see orientation and then stopped and explained I could go no further and maintain proper VLOS.

I’d have expected the examiner to approve. If they insisted I go further I’d have ended my own test and raised a formal complaint with the CAA.

That was the idea of the exercise, to see if you’d still got VLOS and orientation at that distance. If you can’t see it at any distance, they accept that as VLOS for your circumstance, if you can’t see past 300 metres that’s OK with them.

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You did your GVC with UAVHUB, right? I’d bet money that if you stopped at 350m and said you could safely go no further you’d get an approving nod.

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Yeah, Matt was very good, very patient even when the Police helicopter came over two or three times, the resident buzzard was attacked by the geese and the sparrowhawk zapped across the flight area every couple of minutes. UAVHUB have done it with enough people now to understand that geriatric old gits like me have got less efficient eyesight than some of the young whipper snappers, so I should think that if you said at 300 metres “that’s as far as I can safely see the drone”, you’d probably get an extra point!
If you’ve got a strobe on the back, at least you’ve got some sort of idea which way you’re pointing.

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Eh?

Mistaken identity, thought you’d posted one of the other replies.