{"id":25615,"date":"2016-04-14T13:33:32","date_gmt":"2016-04-14T18:33:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=25615"},"modified":"2016-04-14T13:33:32","modified_gmt":"2016-04-14T18:33:32","slug":"drone-law-101","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2016\/04\/drone-law-101\/","title":{"rendered":"Drone Law 101"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) estimates<\/a> that almost 2.5 million unmanned aerial systems, more commonly known as drones, will be purchased in 2016, and that annual sales will reach almost 7 million units by 2020.\u00a0 Drones have been or soon will be employed in an ever-broadening \"drone\"<\/a>sphere of applications, including photography, natural resource mapping and management, hobbyist flying, military and police applications, and perhaps even package delivery.\u00a0 But as with many fast-emerging technologies, governance regimes have not kept pace with science.\u00a0 As a result, many of these millions of purchasers have at least one thing in common: uncertainty over how their flying activities are regulated.<\/p>\n

On Friday, April 8, the Environmental Law Society hosted a discussion of the future of drone regulation at the federal and state levels, featuring three experts: Russ Klingaman<\/a>, who teaches Aviation Law and is a licensed pilot; Eric Compas<\/a>, a UW-Whitewater professor and drone enthusiast who has received grant funding to investigate the use of drones for natural resource and disaster recovery purposes; and Detective Eric Draeger of the Milwaukee Police Department.\u00a0 In a wide-ranging discussion, the panelists agreed that legal regimes governing drones are constantly evolving.\u00a0 They grouped the top legal challenges related to drones into three categories: safety, privacy, and security.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Handling air safety falls within the FAA\u2019s sphere of responsibility, Klingaman said.\u00a0 He admitted that the current regulations are often confusing and difficult to navigate, even for experts.\u00a0 The agency is in the process of developing new rules, and Klingaman expects it to create\u00a0\u201ctiers\u201d of regulations, one for nearby uses and others for longer distances.\u00a0 The panelists touched on a variety of the currently applicable safety regulations.\u00a0 Klingaman reiterated his comment in a recent interview<\/a> that the so-called \u201cline of sight\u201d requirement \u2013 that the drone must be operated within the pilot\u2019s field of vision \u2013 is the biggest limitation to commercial drone uses.\u00a0 Compas explained that another difficulty lies in separating his personal roles as a drone user; one set of regulations applies when he flies as a hobbyist, and a different set when he flies professionally as part of his research or teaching as a UW-Whitewater faculty member.\u00a0 Commercial use requires at least a sport pilot\u2019s license, absent an exemption granted by the FAA.<\/p>\n

Privacy, on \"Drone<\/a>the other hand, is the responsibility of the states.\u00a0 Approximately 32 states have enacted a hodgepodge of far-from-uniform laws governing privacy concerns, according to the panelists.\u00a0 In Wisconsin, 2013 Act 213<\/a> provides that drones may not be used to photograph or observe individuals in locations that give rise to \u201ca reasonable expectation of privacy.\u201d\u00a0 Similarly, law enforcement must obtain a search warrant if using a drone to gather evidence from a location whose occupants have an \u201cexpectation of privacy.\u201d\u00a0 Draeger commented that it\u2019s not clear exactly what that means, in either context.<\/p>\n

The panelists also discussed the positive and negative aspects of drones under the broad umbrella of \u201csecurity.\u201d\u00a0 On the positive side, law enforcement agencies can use drones to perform tasks that are dangerous or otherwise difficult for humans.\u00a0 Draeger noted that the Milwaukee Police Department doesn\u2019t have any drones yet, but expects that all law enforcement agencies will use them within the next decade.\u00a0 This widespread usage will create interactions with other aspects of criminal law, requiring courts to decide, for example, how the Fourth Amendment prohibition on unreasonable searches and seizures applies to drone operations.<\/p>\n

Conversely, due to operator malfeasance or (more commonly) lack of skill, drones sometimes fly where they shouldn\u2019t.\u00a0 Their surprisingly frequent approaches to commercial airliners are well documented<\/a>.\u00a0 In another recent incident, a hobbyist mistakenly landed a drone in the Waupun prison yard<\/a>.\u00a0 Yet another recently crash-landed near the White House<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Near the conclusion of the program, an audience member asked what he, as a hobbyist, should do to ensure he complies with the law.\u00a0 Klingaman responded that at a minimum, a hobbyist must register <\/a>the drone and comply with the FAA\u2019s \u201cknow before you fly\u201d guidelines for recreational users<\/a>, which include maximum altitude requirements and mandatory separation distances from airfields, among other things.\u00a0 The problem?\u00a0 Those requirements may change as soon as this year, or whenever the FAA releases its new rule package.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) estimates that almost 2.5 million unmanned aerial systems, more commonly known as drones, will be purchased in 2016, and that annual sales will reach almost 7 million units by 2020.\u00a0 Drones have been or soon will be employed in an ever-broadening sphere of applications, including photography, natural resource mapping and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environmental-law","category-public","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25615\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}