Report: Most drone accidents caused by the tech and not the operator
If you believe the hype, we're mere minutes from having hot meals delivered by drone. That's why it's concerning we know so little about drone accidents and what causes them.
A team of academics in Australia have tried to remedy that lack of information. Led by Graham Wild, a senior lecturer in aviation at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, they reviewed a sample of 152 global drone event reports between 2006 and 2015.
Examining cases gathered from databases such as the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) and the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) Accident and Incident Data System, they found technology issues were more often to blame for accidents in the sample, as opposed to human error.
You May Also Like
Most often at fault was a loss of communication or radio signal between the drone and controls, Wild told Mashable Australia.
You'd be forgiven for thinking 152 drone accidents seems like a small number in 10 years. However Wild emphasised that far more incidents occur, but few are followed up with sufficiently detailed reports. That's something that could become a real problem in the drone-age.
"It's not mandated that you report all these details as it would be if you were flying at a general aviation airport," he explained. "A lot of the stuff with drones is literally just voluntary and sometimes people put in the bare minimum."
According to Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) spokesperson Peter Gibson, drone accidents in Australia must be reported.
So little information was available to the research team, they couldn't even determine what type of drone was most commonly involved in accidents. Less than 20 percent of the reports had enough information to let the team determine physical details, Wild said, such as the takeoff weight of the aircraft.
Wild called for drone accident reporting to be mandatory globally for commercial drone pilots, and more stringent airworthiness requirements also be instated.
"If we want make [drone] aviation as safe as commercial air transport, we need to report," Wild explained. "And we need to assure the airworthiness of these aircraft, as opposed to letting people build anything they want."
"If you were at an airport and it was purely the pilot's decision whether the plane was ready to fly or not, would result in a very large array of problems."
He emphasised he was not talking about legislating the airworthiness of hobby drones you might buy from toy shops. Rather, he's focused on a whole range of drones being made for new commercial applications: Movie studios that want to fly to take footage or real estate agents hoping to film aerial video of properties.
Wild pointed out that under drone regulations in the U.S., for example, commercial operators of drones under 25 kilograms (55 pounds) must pass an aeronautical knowledge test, but airworthiness certification is not required.
CASA has issued a proposal to cover airworthiness for all non-recreational drones.
"If you were at an airport and it was purely the pilot's decision whether the plane was ready to fly or not, that would result in a very large array of problems," he pointed out. "The pilot is not technically qualified to be the maintenance engineer for an aircraft, and most drone operators are not qualified to assess the airworthiness of their aircraft."
In his view, training drone operators to assess airworthiness would be a useful step. If you have a multi-rotor drone, for example, examining the equipment for cracks after a hard landing, or checking the motors and balance.
The industry may need to become just a little more professional, if we want those dreams of drone delivery realised.
Wild's study was published in the Aerospace journal. The ATSB has been contacted by Mashable Australia for comment on the numbers in the report.
Ariel Bogle was an associate editor with Mashable in Australia covering technology. Previously, Ariel was associate editor at Future Tense in Washington DC, an editorial initiative between Slate and New America.
