New FAA Part 107 Rules, New Confusion

With the new changes to 14 CFR Part 107, we’re seeing a lot of confusion in the forums. And yes, we know that people don’t live and breath on the forums, so the confusion is understandable. 

As a 107 Pilot, one of your responsibilities is to stay current on new regs. But where do you go? There are certainly pages at www.faa.gov/uas, and of course you can jump right into the horse’s mouth and get the information directly from the Federal Register. And there are many blogs and article out there. 

But what about a single article that explains everything in simple language, without government mumbo-jumbo, and/or “FAA-speak”? Those of us in the aviation industry find ourselves frequently talking in acronyms, even when we don’t mean to. So hopefully this article will alleviate some of the confusion. And we’ll explain some of the acronyms as they come up. Because more knowledge in the aviation field is never a bad thing. Most 107 Pilots don’t come from an aviation background. So this is a new language for many of us.

So, where does the confusion come from?

As most of you know, the FAA recently instituted new regulations concerning Part 107 rules. And since they’ve staggered the release of those new rules, there seems to be a ton of confusion out there about what happens when, which rules apply to which operations, and which drones satisfy the criteria of which rules. And since the DOT had to delay the rules’ effective dates twice, the confusion was compounded.

In this article we’ll discuss the new recurrent training and initial test for 107 Pilots, the night operation rules, and the operations over people (OOP) and operations over moving vehicles (OMV). We won’t discuss UAS remote identification (RID) because that is way too far down the road, and won’t be an issue until 9/16/2023. The only thing we’ll say about RID is “Don’t Panic!”.

Let’s start with Recurrent Training (& initial 107 test) that was rolled out on 4/6/2021.

Online Recurrent Training replaces the in-person Unmanned General Recurrent (UGR) test that we 107 Pilots had to take in the past. It is free, and it is only available at www.faasafety.gov. The link to that training is https://www.faasafety.gov/gslac/ALC/CourseLanding.aspx?cID=677. And make sure you take ALC-677 if you only have a Remote Pilot Certificate. There is another Unmanned Recurrent Training called ALC-515. That is ONLY for current manned pilots (Part 61). If you are a Part 107 only, and you take ALC-515, you are not current.

That training (ALC-677) consists of an Introduction, three sections of study, a Review, and the Exam. 

First you read and listen to the study sections, take a few practice quizzes while doing that, read the review after Section 3, and then take the Exam. The Exam consists of 45 questions based on the sections you just studied. All exam questions are multiple choice, and you self grade your exam once you’re done. If there are any questions wrong, it has you go back and change those answers. Once you have all of the questions correct, you “pass” and are directed to your certificate page where you can print out the certificate and a card. You then carry those with you when you fly. If you lose that certificate, sign back into your FAASafety account and go to “Print Course Certificates” under your account heading. You’ll find that certificate there. 

Remember, the Recurrent Training is free.

There are a couple of things tied to the recurrent training. First is the ability for fly your UAS at night without a 107.29 Daylight Waiver. But you MUST take the new recurrent training or initial 107 test in order to take advantage of that. Either of those taken after 4/6/2021 qualifies you. In the test and training, you will learn about the nighttime illusions that can cause visual issues when flying at night, and you’ll learn that you need to have strobes on your drone in order to fly at night. And those strobes must be visible from 3 statute miles (3SM), and must have “a flash rate sufficient to avoid a collision”.

Second, once you take your recurrent training (ALC-677), your 24 Calendar Month resets for your next recurrent training requirement. 24 Calendar Months means that the you need to become current again by the end of the month, 24 months after you took the training. So if you were one of the ones that took the training on April 6th, 2021 when it became available, you become non-current at 12:01AM on May 1st, 2023. You have to take new recurrent training by that time in order to stay current. It’s not the day you took the training or test that matters, it’s the month. This confuses a lot of people, so if that’s you, you’re not alone.

Also, you can take the recurrent training anytime you want. You do not have to wait until your currency is due. Or, if you don’t have any need to fly at night, you can wait until it time to renew.

So, to recap this: In order to fly your UAS at night under 107 rules, you must either have a 107.29 waiver, or have taken the online training or initial 107 test after 4/6/2021. But, the New Rules don’t go into effect until April 21, 2021. So don’t put those drones up at night just yet.

Why the 4/21/2021 date?

4/21/2021 is the effective date the final delay pushed the new rules to. As was 4/6/2021 for the new test/training for 107. And that is why there is a 15 day gap in the implementation of your Night Flight privileges if you take the recurrent training or initial testing after 4/6. No, it doesn’t make sense, but it’s only two weeks. Definitely doable.

On 4/21/2021, we have the Night Ops rule we just discussed, but we also have two other very important (& very confusing) rules that go into effect. If you have a current Part 107 Remote Pilot Certificate, you can take advantage to these two privileges. Those privileges are Operations Over People (OOP), and Operations Over Moving Vehicles (OMV) without a waiver. Those waivers are 107.39 for OOP, and 107.145 for OMV. Both of those two sections are still eligible for waivers if you want to fly outside of the regulations that allow those flights without waivers. And for those two rules, you don’t have take the test or training after 4/6/2021. They are automatic if you have a current Remote Pilot Certificate.

Also, all 107.29 waivers will be “terminated” by the FAA on May 17,2021. They will no longer be usable. If you have a 107.29 waiver tied to a 107.41 Airspace Authorization, there is currently no method announced for night flights in controlled airspace. We’ve been told unofficially that something will be announced on 4/21/2021, but that is NOT an official date. Your 107.41 Airspace Authorizations will still be valid after 5/17/2021, except for night flights. Daylight flights will still be allowed. Twilight flights have not been addressed yet.

OOP and OMV. You must know the rules, or you’ll get in trouble.

Let’s talk about OOP and OMV regulations a bit. Because it’s pretty much a given that these two regulation will be the most violated due to misunderstanding. And we as 107 Pilots need to make sure we fully understand those rules. We won’t go into the details, because you can do that in our other article. But we’ll cover the high points.

On 4/21/2021 you can start to fly Category 1 drones over people. Category 1 drones are EXTREMELY limited in scope. And their use for flying over “open air assemblies” are limited to those drones capable of RID. 

However, those Category 1 drones without RID can still fly over people and moving vehicles, but as mentioned are EXTREMELY limited in scope. In order to qualify for Category 1 operations, your drone must be under .55lbs (250g), and “Does not contain any exposed rotating parts that would lacerate human skin upon impact with a human being.” That last section about rotating parts is very important. 

One drone everyone wants to use for Category 1 operations is the very popular DJI Mavic Mini or DJI Mini 2. That certainly fulfills the sub 250g requirement, but it doesn’t fulfill the laceration requirement. At least not without prop guards. And adding the prop guards will take it over 250g. There are currently two studies being conducted about the Mini, so stay tuned for more information to be released tomorrow on our podcast.

But for now, the only DJI drone that will meet the Category 1 operational criteria is a Tello with prop guards. If you want to fly over people after 4/21/2021 without a waiver, you are very limited to which drones are available. Kenji and Vic are both working on small cinewhoops with a de-cased (naked) GoPro6. The builds are based on 95mm ducted frames. Those will satisfy the first two parts of Category 1, but it remains to be seen if adding a future RID module will push them over 250g. But they’ll work for now as long as we don’t fly over “open air assemblies”.

For OMV operations, those rules mirror the OOP rules. One difference is that if you’re flying a qualified drone under OOP rules, you can only fly transitionally (side to side), and not with traffic. So you can only fly from one side of the road to the other, and not follow the vehicles as they drive down the road.

There are also operations for OOP and OMV for Category 2-4. We don’t dive into those, other than to mention a few nuggets. You can find that criteria in another article.

All operations taking place with drones under Category 2-4 must be certified by the manufacturer, and approved by the FAA. And those drones won’t hit the market until Quarter 1, 2023. And that timeline is probably a tad optimistic. Unlike Category 1 operations, where the Remote Pilot In Command (RPIC) will self-certify the aircraft for those operations, no RPIC is allowed to certify the drones flown under those three other operations. And currently no drones sold or made are qualified for Category 2-4 operations, either OOP, or OMV. At least they don’t qualify without a waiver.

Unless you currently have a waiver for operations over people (a 107.39 Waiver), there is no way for you to legally fly your DJI, Autel, Yuneec, or any other popular drone over people (Tello & a few small cinewhoops excluded). And don’t expect any until next year.

So to recap:

~Night flights w/o a waiver are allowed after 4/21/2021 if you’ve taken the recurrent training or initial 107 test after 4/6/2021.

~After 4/21/2021 a current Part 107 Pilot may fly over people and moving vehicles without a waiver under very limited conditions, and with a very limited number of aircraft. Category 1 operations only!

~Taking the recurrent training resets your 107 Currency 24 Calendar Month clock.

~You can take your recurrent training at anytime you want. You don’t have to wait for the 24 month clock to expire.

~You do not have to take the recurrent training if you’re current now, and don’t want to fly at night.

~Your current Daylight Waiver (107.29) will “terminate” on 5/17/21.

~Your 107.41 Airspace Authorization will be usable until they expire if you have your 107.29 tied to it. You just can’t fly at night there.

~No drone currently on the market will satisfy Category 2-4 OOP and OMV operations. Expected date to market will be Quarter 1, 2022 at the earliest.

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While the new Remote Pilot Initial Test and Recurrent Training will teach you the legal way to fly at night, there is much more involved on the safety side. Please consider taking an additional night flight course. We recommend the course at Pilot Institute..

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