Drone News: Remote ID Delay, Mini 4 Pro Price, FAA Gives BVLOS, Pilot Sentenced, and DAA Campaigns

Welcome to your weekly news update, we have 5 stories for you
this week; Remote ID Delay confirmed, Mini 4 pro pricing leaks,
the FAA gives UPS and uAvionix BVLOS, TFR Violating Drone Pilot
Sentenced, and the DAA announces more campaigns!


Your first story will sound familiar if you saw our video earlier
this week, the FAA has announced discretionary enforcement of
remote ID. The FAA has officially - See link in the description -
published discretionary enforcement for Remote ID until March
16th, 2024. Compliance date if you are able is STILL Sept. 16th,
2023. Discretionary enforcement ENDS on March 16th, 2024. If
you’re waiting on your module, firmware, or FRIAs, you have an
extra 6 months. For everyone else, you still need to comply as of
the 16th of September, 2023. We’re very glad to see the FAA has
responded to our previous video and letter requesting for
discretionary enforcement until March. Alright, next up we have
some pricing leaks for the rumored Mini 4 Pro, coming from
Europe. As reported by DroneXL, the drone only will run 799,
drone with the RC 2 at 999, and the fly more combo at 1129.
Pricing is currently only reported as euros, but we can expect
similar pricing here as drone prices in Europe tend to be just a
bit more expensive than the US. Interestingly we see the DJI RC 2
package here nearly confirming that the Mini 4 will come with O4.
We haven’t seen any other leaks on when the new Mini will be
released, but we speculate within the next month. In the third
story this week, the FAA granted UPS Flight Forward and uAvionix
BVLOS waivers. UPS will be utilizing Matternet M2 drones, which
have an airworthiness certificate. uAvionix will utilize Rapace
drones to test their detect and avoid technology. These two
companies join Phoenix Air Unmanned in operating BVLOS to capture
data for the FAA. The FAA will then use this data to create
standards for routine BVLOS in the future. According to the FAA
at Commercial UAV Expo, we could see a BVLOS NPRM as soon as
August of 2024 with a final rule in 2025. We’ll keep you updated
as we see more! Next up we have sentencing for the Bengals Game
TFR violation… 25 Year Old Dailon Dabney was sentenced to a year
of probation and 40 hours of community service for operating his
DJI Air 2S over the Bengals VS Raiders game last year. Dabney
posted the video on YouTube, resulting in massive backlash from
those in the UAS industry, and went as far as to taunt the FAA
that they couldn’t find him. In the video, the Air 2S is flow
down into the stadium, over people and the field, and inside of a
stadium TFR. The sentencing comes from the Department of Justice,
not from the FAA, so it’s possible the FAA has fined Dabney in
addition to the sentencing. We’ve said it once and we’ll keep
saying it… Don’t be that guy. Finally, we have the Drone Advocacy
Alliance who has announced three more campaigns. If you’re
unfamiliar with the Drone Advocacy Alliance, the group is an
alliance of companies across the UAS industry that advocate
against restrictions in what drones may be used by industry and
public safety. The new campaigns include opposing restrictions in
federal bill appropriations, restrictions in the FAA
Reauthorization act, and other market restrictions in the NDAA.
If you’d like to get involved or read more about these topics,
we’ll put a link in the description below! That’s all for this
week, we’ll be in Buena Vista Colorado on Sunday for the Colorado
UAS Roundup! We hope to see you there, we’ll see you next week!
https://dronexl.co/2023/09/08/faa-ups-uavionix-bvlos/
https://dronexl.co/2023/09/11/dji-mini-4-pro-european-pricing/
https://dronexl.co/2023/09/13/drone-disruption-changes-nfl-game-rules/
https://droneadvocacyalliance.com/take-action/