- Prime Air could get its wings clipped (Image: AP)
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Although drone proponents were positive about it overall about, the proposal does leave some potential applications out in cold. As of now, the rules don't permit flight during the night or outside the pilot's line of sight – which would prevent Amazon from delivering packages using such craft.
In the US, drones have long lived in a legal grey area. Congress has asked the FAA to come up with comprehensive rules by September this year. The plans released this week are the first official glimpse at what will be possible for drones in the future.
Under the proposal, people would be allowed to fly registered drones weighing up to 25 kilograms, provided that they stay below 150 metres and 160 kilometres an hour. Pilots must also be at least 17 years old, pass an aeronautics test and be vetted by the Transportation Security Administration.
Droning on
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The suggested regulations are surprisingly flexible, says Matt Waite at the Drone Journalism Lab at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. "This is the most hopeful I've been about the prospects for drone journalism in quite some time," he wrote in a blog post.
Ella Atkins, an aerospace engineer at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, agrees that the proposal makes reasonable demands of would-be drone pilots. "The document is a little better than what I would have thought," she said. "It's good news for engineers, scientists, and others such as myself who want to use UAVs for research."
Meanwhile, Amazon appears to remain hopeful about future updates to the FAA's rule book. "We are committed to realizing our vision for Prime Air and are prepared to deploy where we have the regulatory support we need," Paul Misener, vice president of global public policy for Amazon, in a statement.
It will probably take at least a year before the rules go into effect, during which time they are likely to evolve. Over the next 60 days, members of the public are invited to weigh in.
In addition, in a separate move, US president Barack Obama signed a memorandum on Sunday requiring federal agencies to publish information within the next year regarding their drone policies.