Special status for search & rescue drones requested
Cork City Council will seek approval from national authorities to have Cork City Missing Persons Search and Rescue (CCMPSAR) designated as a ‘blue light operator’ for the purposes of using drones.
Restrictions for drone operators on the north side of the city are currently in place by IAA. These require users to seek permission two-days in advance of their flight, and provide details of the radius and times they will be operating in.
Blue light operators are not required to wait the two days, and can act immediately in an emergency.
Cllr Peter Horgan said the restrictions have meant that CCMPSR, which he said act as a blue light operator “in all but name”, have been and will continue to be impeded in their work.
The council will write to the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) and the National Co-Ordination Group for Emergency Planning (NCGEP) to try and have the change made.
Chris O’Donovan of CCMPSAR said the group uses drones in almost all their operations, and that the restrictions have been “very odious”.
He said they have made a provisional agreement with the IAA that they would not be required to go through the two day waiting period should there be an emergency, but that this has yet to be tested in practice.
Where the issue has arisen has been in their training of drone pilots.
“If we want to do any training, we have to fill out a form two days in advance. So if the weather is good Saturday morning and you decide to go out, you’d have had to have applied for permission on Thursday.
“Up until a few weeks ago we could have done it whenever we wanted,” he said.
He said the group has invested in state of the art drones, one with thermal imaging technology.
“The fact that they at the moment could legally not send up a drone without approval from a private company and the IAA, and have to give the radius where they’re sending up a drone, is just simply wrong,” said Cllr Horgan.
The IAA announced a temporary unmanned aircraft geographical zone (UGZ) on 6 February. A public consultation on whether to maintain the zone closed on 14 March.
The restrictions were put in place to facilitate Dublin-based drone delivery company Manna.
The first flight of Manna’s Cork pilot scheme took off from the Marina Market on 19 February.
However, since then the IAA has reportedly received hundreds of complaints from residents.
The IAA have been invited to attend the next meeting of the council’s Transport Special Policy Committee (SPC).
This article was produced with the support of the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme funded by Coimisiún na Meán.