Originally Posted by
franklin_m
My point to the AMA is that all it will take is one. One "Fast Freddy" at Mayhem Park that instead of pulling out of his high speed dive loses control and crashes his turbine in the middle of a busy interstate resulting in big pile up with injuries or worse.
And all it will take is one...commercial delivery drone that goes stupid and crashes in the middle of a busy interstate resulting in big pile up with injuries or worse. Or one that loses power and crashes through the roof of an occupied house, causing injuries or worse.
I haven't finished writing up my comments, so I'm thinking about adding a couple of items related to commercial delivery drone safety. I mean, these things are obviously going to be bigger, heavier, and probably faster than typical model airplanes; so their damage potential is greater. In addition, projected numbers are much greater than the number of model airplanes, further increasing the risk. So it's entirely appropriate to recommend risk mitigation, such as:
Requiring all UAS used for commercial delivery purposes to undergo a formal risk analysis, and prohibiting commercial operations unless the manufacturer can show all flight-critical components have a MTBF of not less than 1,000,000 flight hours.
For each flight critical component having an MTBF of 1,000,000 to 1,000,000,000 flight hours, a backup component shall be provided. The system shall auto-detect failures and shall be capable of continued operation with one component failed. For a non-simultaneous second like failures, the system (if fixed wing type) shall be controllable to a safe landing. If rotary wing type it shall immediately enter a vertical descent to impact. (In the flight control business we call this "fail-op/fail-safe")
Furthermore, given the low altitudes at which such systems will operate, they shall at all times be operated such that, considering the current velocity vector, a total loss of control will result in impact no closer than 100' to any person, vehicle, or building, other than the intended points of departure and landing.
Ya wanna fly pizza to my neighbor's house? Fine with me -- just keep the thing 100' away from mine. Houses in the neighborhood not separated by 200'? Too bad. Safety is paramount, ya know.
Now would you like to help me word it more properly?