"Steven P. McNicoll" wrote in message
nk.net...

"Tony Cox" wrote in message
nk.net...

It is if the pilot can't scan for traffic or search for a
suitable emergency landing site.


Is the UAV pilot not able to scan for traffic or search for a suitable
emergency landing site?

Unless the entire system (camera=ground station=operator)
can match private pilot vision requirements, and is as flexible and
responsive as a qualified private pilot, then the UAV will always
be inherently less safe.

The MIT report does its statistical analysis assuming that the UAV
will just blunder into whatever happens to be in its airspace, and that
if the engine fails it'll come down like a WW2 doodlebug. As reported
before, "collision avoidance" seems to boil down to dodging aircraft
with active transponders. It doesn't appear from anything said so
far in the thread that anyone in the UAV program has considered the
situation from a VFR pilot's point of view.

I have no problem with UAVs -- if their use is confined to
MOAs or MTRs or anywhere else where we have a 'heads up'
that some 'unusual' traffic can be expected. But if these things are
buzzing around in the NAS, then it's reasonable that they obey the
same rules as the rest of us. Otherwise, lets just dispense with the
PP vision & medical requirements, junk 91.113(b) and have
a free-for-all.


You're proposing that these UAV's
can simply ignore this rule because they're supposed to be in class
A all the time.


I proposed nothing at all like that.

I assumed this was what you meant when you said
in a response to Larry:- "There is no altitude
reference outside of Class A airspace, so presumably
see-and-avoid is not an issue.". Did I misunderstand you?