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Drones are becoming increasingly popular amongst photography lovers, and they are entering our lives quickly. Drones offer the unique opportunity not only to see the world from a bird's eye view and to preserve the memory in your digital archives but also provide completely new business opportunities. With their increasing popularity, drones are raising questions about their danger for society and legal regulations for their use.
Unmanned aerial vehicles, also known as drones, are a fast-growing sector with great potential for economic growth in the European Union. The EU has therefore adopted a regulation on the safe integration of remote-controlled drones into European airspace. On 11 May, two normative acts were published in the Official Journal of the EU, which created uniform rules for drones - Delegated Regulation (EU) 2019/945 and EC Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/947. The first sets out the technical requirements and certification of unmanned aircraft and their operators and the second set out the rules and procedures for their operation.
Regulations divide drones into three categories of use - unlimited, specific and certified. In the unlimited category, there are aircraft with a take-off mass of less than 25 kg - these are the drones for mass use that we have seen and used. This category introduces a requirement for pilots to ensure that the drone is at a safe distance from people and that it is not controlled over places where many people have gathered. This practically brings the practice of drones filming mass events such as concerts, rallies and other events to an end. But flying is allowed over people who are walking separately, following safety rules. It is accepted that any drone weighing more than 900 grams and flying faster than 65 kph will be required to undergo registration and identification.
In Bulgaria, airspace regulation of the use of remotely controlled aircraft has been in place since 1999, but back then drones did not exist, and it is only talked about unmanned balloons. Very few drone users know that right now in Bulgaria for unmanned aircraft flights, prior authorization is required from the General Directorate "Civil Aviation Administration" (GVA) with accurate GPS coordinates for the place of flight, its date and exact start and end time, regardless of where in Bulgaria you have decided to fly your drone. Thirty minutes before the flight, you must call the Airspace Planning and Distribution Center and activate the prerequested operating area. The procedure for obtaining a permit is a bit sluggish - it takes at least five days before the date of the request for the planned flight. But in case of non-compliance with the Civil Aviation Act, the fine is from BGN 1,000 to BGN 10,000.
For the so-called "unlimited" category of drones - weighing up to 25 kg, no prior authorization is required. The remote control pilot will need to ensure that the drone is at a safe distance from people and does not rise to a height of more than 120 meters above the ground.
A few tips on what to do when flying a drone: Maintain a constant visual connection to the drone, plan your route carefully and scope out the area so that there are no obstacles in visibility, apply for flight permission if you want to use your drone for work.
And a few things that you should NOT do: do not fly over restricted areas, do not pass over crowds, do not fly at night and do not fly in bad weather!
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