Transport Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2016

[The Chair (Hon. Judy A. Sgro (Humber River—Black Creek, Lib.)), Liberal, Judy Sgro]

We will convene our meeting today.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) we move into a study of unmanned aerial vehicle, UAV, regulations. We have with us from the Air Line Pilots Association International, Dan Adamus, president of the Canadian board. From the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association, we have Bernard Gervais, president and chief executive officer, and on video conference from Halifax, Nova Scotia, we have David Fraser, partner, McInnes Cooper.

Welcome to you all. Thank you very much for coming today and giving us some additional information on this subject. We've been looking forward for some months to finding time in our schedule to look at it.

Mr. Adamus, would you like to start?

[Captain Dan Adamus, President, Canada Board, Air Line Pilots Association International]

Thank you very much.

My name is Captain Dan Adamus. I'm the president of the Air Line Pilots Association International's Canada board. I am an airline pilot, and I have been for 34 years.

The Air Line Pilots Association International represents just over 54,000 pilots who fly for 31 Canadian and U.S. airlines. We are also the largest non-governmental safety and security agency in the world.

We appreciate the opportunity to provide our perspective on the critical importance of safely integrating unmanned air vehicles, UAVs—or, as I will refer to them today, unmanned aircraft systems, UAS—into the Canadian national airspace system, the NAS.

I think you see a bit of a theme here. There are lots of acronyms in aviation, and I'll refer to some of these acronyms in my notes today.

The airspace in North America is the most dynamic and diverse such system in the world. ALPA fully supports the safe integration of UAS operations into the NAS. This is not a new issue, and our support for the future of UAS in the NAS as well as our perspective on the issues associated with safe integration are reflected in this statement.

The safety of the NAS must be maintained to deliver the safest and most efficient air transportation services in the world. Although the focus today is the Canadian NAS, we must point out that the safety issues highlighted are independent of any national airspace boundary and are faced by ALPA's pilots as we operate around the globe.

In August 2015, the FAA published a list of pilot reports of UAS encounters. ALPA reviewed the 764 events, which cover only the period from November 2014 through August 2015. Canada has also seen a rapid rise in reported occurrences of UAS, with a tenfold increase in drone encounters year over year. Both the volume of events and many of the event descriptions are sobering reminders to the industry that the risk of a collision between a UAS and an aircraft has increased significantly. ALPA believes that a significant step toward the eventual solution to safely integrating UAS into the NAS includes four fundamental elements.

The first is education. Anyone who plans to fly UAS must understand the aircraft, the airspace, and the other aircraft that could be encountered while flying. In the case of UAS that might be commercially flown for compensation or hire, the pilot must hold a commercial pilot certificate to ensure that he or she possesses the appropriate skill and experience to meet safety standards designed to protect the flying public. Those flying UAS for recreational purposes must adhere to the guidelines, keeping the UAS within line of sight, at heights under 90 metres, and at least nine kilometres from airports. ALPA urges Parliament to provide definitive authority and remove any ambiguity about the extent to which Transport Canada has the authority to regulate UAS operated for recreation, modelling, and hobby purposes.

Based on what Transport Canada has documented to date, the ongoing educational efforts under way by Transport Canada and the recreational UAS segment of the industry are still inadequate.

With the holiday season on the horizon, UAS operations will likely increase. ALPA recommends that Transport Canada expand their outreach initiative, encouraging manufacturers, businesses, and volunteer organizations with a vested interest in safe UAS operations to aggressively promote safe UAS operations, which include avoiding encounters with airline aircraft.

The second element is registration. ALPA endorsed the FAA's rapid implementation of a UAS registration requirement for all but the smallest aircraft. Gathering basic information about the identity of the individual purchasing the UAS not only allows law enforcement authorities to identify the owner if the UAS were to encounter a problem, but it helps make clear the serious nature of operating a UAS in the NAS and the responsibility to safeguard public safety. ALPA encourages Transport Canada to implement a registration system as soon as possible. Additionally, ALPA recommends that Transport Canada implement registration of UAS at the point of sale. This method will ensure the greatest possible compliance with the registration requirements.

The third element is technology. If UAS are operated either intentionally or unintentionally in airspace that aircraft use, pilots need to be able to see them on the cockpit displays, controllers need the ability to see them on their radar scopes, and the UAS must be equipped with active technologies that ensure that the UAS is capable of avoiding collision with manned aircraft.

In these types of operations, technology must enable the pilots to control and interact with them in the same manner as if the pilots were on board. If a UAS is restricted by regulations from operating in a particular geographic area and/or altitude, it must have technology that cannot be overridden that limits the geographic areas and altitude in which it can operate. This may include permanent locations, such as Parliament and all public airports, as well as temporary restrictions, such as for wildfires or natural disaster areas.

Transport Canada should expand its ongoing evaluation of technologies that are capable of identifying UAS and operator locations. Transport Canada should ensure that resources are available for the development of UAS-centric collision avoidance technologies, with standards in place for their adoption as soon as possible.

Number four is penalties and enforcement. UAS pilots must be properly trained and must understand the consequences of possible malfunctions. Anyone flying a UAS that is a hazard to other aircraft in the airspace, especially anyone who chooses to do so recklessly near airports, must be identified and appropriately prosecuted. We support the criminalization of intentionally unsafe operation of UAS and penalties for unintentional unsafe UAS operations.

If Transport Canada intends to rely on first responders to ensure UAS regulatory compliance, it should better inform local, regional, state, and national law enforcement officials. Providing law enforcement officials with information that defines unlawful operations, provides peer-to-peer contact information, and clarifies the regulatory authority, as well as other pertinent information, is critical for an effective use of first responders to ensure UAS regulatory compliance.

In closing, ALPA supports the ongoing efforts to safely integrate UAS into the North American airspace system. We realize that UAS create many opportunities to benefit society. However, the integration needs to be done in a way that ensures that aviation safety is not compromised and that the target level of safety for commercial air travel in the NAS is proactively, not reactively, protected.

We are fully aware that there is a strong desire by UAS proponents and those who wish to become UAS operators to begin flying in the NAS as quickly as possible. Clearly, there are commercial, social, business, and international competitive advantages to a strong UAS industry. However, government and industry must take a longer view of this present state of technology to ensure that robust safety systems, in tandem with Transport Canada-certified redundant systems of UAS, are developed that completely integrate with commercial airline operations and, above all, do so safely. An imprudent rush to create and implement minimum standards will not only harm safety, but potentially produce a setback for the future expansion of UAS operations for years to come.

On behalf of the 54,000 airline pilots whose top priority is safe transportation, we thank the committee for the opportunity to appear before you today, and we look forward to working together to ensure the safety of our air transportation system.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Adamus.

Mr. Gervais, go ahead.

[Bernard Gervais, President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Owners and Pilots Association]

Thank you for the opportunity.

The Canadian Owners and Pilots Association, or COPA, represents general aviation in the country. It has 17,000 members across the country. It's not the organization of the airlines or of the scheduled air transportation system, but anything other than that. It is general aviation. That's who we represent. It's the smaller aircraft. It could be business or it could be outfitters up north or in different places. It's the general aviation portion of what's happening in the transportation system in Canada.

We're also part of the 75-member International Council of Aircraft Owner and Pilot Associations around the world. We have a seat at the International Civil Aviation Organization, or ICAO, representing general aviation, so we have someone in Montreal in this context.

We have done some representation at ICAO already concerning general aviation and what we feel about what are called remotely piloted aircraft, or RPAs, or UAVs, or UAS, as they take all these different acronyms. We've done some lobbying with ICAO already, saying that there are some items we're really pushing for. We have four of these items.

One is that we should be able to share the sky without added equipage in our aircraft in the present fleet. In other words, manned aircraft should not have to get some new stuff on board to avoid and to be able to fly with the RPAs or the UAVs.

Another one is that we shouldn't have any NOTAM, which is a notice to airmen. It's sort of a memo out there. We shouldn't have any NOTAMed airspace. Doing so signifies that general aviation and UAVs together are a danger. A NOTAM is a notice for something specific happening. If the airspace is NOTAMed, saying we should watch out, that there's a UAV there, there are going to be NOTAMs all over the country. We couldn't live with this. There has to be no specific NOTAM.

No additional airspace should be set aside in the country for UAVs, except obviously for training and testing purpose, such as the one in Alberta right now. I know there's one in Alma, near Lac Saint-Jean, in Quebec. There are some areas, but there should be no additional airspace set aside for that. We have to cohabit.

Obviously UAVs and RPAs are getting big. In a few years they may be even more numerous than aircraft themselves. We will have to share the skies.

Also, we put the onus and the responsibility to detect and avoid—or sense and avoid, as we may call it—on the RPAs. We have eyeball one and two to see outside, and we have onboard systems in the aircraft with which we can see, with collision avoidance systems of some type. However, the RPAs or UAVs themselves have to be able to detect and avoid.

Those are the four points that we have given to ICAO.

COPA has already responded to a notice of proposed amendment for UAVs that Transport Canada put out last year, in 2015. We do have a few proposals. My colleague mentioned a few that were put out by ALPA. We also put out a few. Obviously we agree on many of them.

One is that we should link all the UAVs out there to someone through a registration. It cannot be anonymous. Whoever has one, whether it's a small toy or a bigger one, should be linked to it. It should be registered.

Education is also an important part. Everyone has to be educated on what they can do with their UAV or RPA. We're also asking that there be no sales out there without a proof-of-competency card. We're asking that the Best Buys and the Future Shops of the world do not sell any of them without one. Even over the counter, there should be a competency proof. Someone has to show that they know what the rules are. We will be living together in that world.

Right now, we feel at COPA that there's a lack of information out there. Even with over-the-counter sales, we've tested a few, and people say, “No, just go on the Transport website.” That's not enough. I even have a magazine here saying that you should be looking at the Transport website, but it doesn't say more than that. There's a lack of information out there.

Right now, we have to see the UAV. Obviously before we move to going beyond the visual line of sight, the technology will have to be foolproof. We're asking for that, and we agree with ALPA on that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Gervais.

Go ahead, Mr. Fraser.

[David Fraser, Partner, McInnes Cooper, As an Individual]

Good morning.

Thank you very much for your very kind invitation to appear before this committee on what I think is a very important topic.

For some background, I'm a lawyer, a partner with McInnes Cooper here in Halifax. My practice focuses entirely on privacy and technology law, with 15 years of experience in dealing with disruptive new technologies.

I have had the opportunity to provide advice to UAV operators and legal advice to companies that look to use UAVs in their operations, but I need to be clear that this morning I'm speaking in my own personal capacity—not on behalf of my firm, not on behalf of its clients, not on behalf of any associations.

Perhaps what informs my view the most is that I am a recreational UAV operator and have been for more than a year now. My interest stems not from the aviation side but from being an avid amateur photographer and videographer. We live in a beautiful country, and it's even more amazingly beautiful when viewed from the air.

I had a photography teacher who told me that 99% of photographs are taken from eye level and suggested going up or going down to get a different perspective. I can tell you, and I'm sure the pilots in the room can tell you, that from 100 or 200 feet, this is an absolutely amazing country, and I enjoy recording it from that perspective.

For these remarks, then, I'm mostly talking from the perspective of a recreational user whose UAV weighs under two kilograms. It's a very small UAV.

I don't think there's any doubt that UAVs are a disruptive new technology spawning an entire new industry that is creating a whole host of new opportunities, both industrial and economic. I'm sure you'll hear from industry experts about the amazing work that UAVs enable, particularly in industries such as agriculture, in areas of forestry, in areas related to transportation of goods, etc.

I hope you'll also hear from some of the many small operators I've heard a lot from, people who have spent the last number of years putting together businesses based on this technology and who have a bit of unease about the next couple of years ahead from the regulatory standpoint. As often happens, this new disruptive technology has been accompanied by something that's often characterized as a bit of a technopanic.

As a privacy lawyer, I hear about privacy concerns all the time. Most of these concerns are actually misplaced, since most of the drones or UAVs that you find in the airspace have wide-angle lenses and aren't useful for surveillance.

There's also, of course, been a lot of concern and discussion about safety. In any time of technopanic, I often espouse taking a step back to take a deep breath and try to deal with facts rather than feelings and fears.

If you do a search in news sites for “drone” and “collision” or “near miss”, you'll see an example of what I perceive to be a level of technopanic. Many of the reports—and I've seen many of them registered in the Canadian airspace—don't bear a whole lot of scrutiny, at least in terms of the sort of UAV drone technology that one is concerned about being sold at Best Buy or appearing under Christmas trees.

The most recent incident is an interesting case in point. It occurred off the Toronto Islands airport and is currently being investigated. The encounter occurred at 9,000 feet over Lake Ontario near the U.S. border. That border is 28 kilometres from the airport and in fact 28 kilometres from land. That's simply beyond the capability of a drone that anybody would purchase at Best Buy. Unless the operator was in a boat, it simply would have been beyond the range and capabilities of most UAVs. Initial reports simply said it was an unidentified object, which could have been a floating bag or something else like that, but the media ran with using the exciting word “drone” in all the headlines, and that's what grabs the attention.

I'm of the view that any approach to regulating drones should prioritize the encouragement of growth and development of this industry in Canada—this industry is here, and it's here to stay—and also, of course, focus on mitigating risks in a realistic way.

If you want a good model to follow, I think we should adopt the very same system as in the U.S. It is very simple. This new approach for drones under 55 pounds is straightforward and much simpler than the proposed Transport Canada regulations. The aircraft has to be marked with a registration number; I can advocate for that. It must make no flights higher than 400 feet, and I can get on board with that. All of it has to be, of course, within visual line of sight, and flights within controlled airspace have to be done with notice to the relevant air traffic control. They've actually implemented a relatively simple system to give that notice.

We should be following this lead; otherwise the U.S. and Europe will dominate this industry, and Canadians will be left behind.

We already have a sensible approach to regulating the use of our waterways. I'm a pleasure craft operator with a small boat that I enjoy using along the harbours and coastlines of beautiful Nova Scotia. In order to operate my boat, I needed to have passed a test and obtained a pleasure craft operator card. The test covered the rules of the road, the international collision regulations, safety rules, and how to operate safely. I also had to register my boat and put its register number on the hull, and I have insurance.

Pleasure crafts coexist with working boats in a lot of ways, and I think UAVs can coexist, and will have to, with existing users of the skies in the same way.

I do also advocate for one of the provisions that I believe Transport Canada is going along with. Those who use model aircraft or small drones within the auspices of a recognized association, under their safety rules and with the benefit of their insurance, should be able to operate within that sphere rather than in a more complicated regulatory environment. However, if you take it outside of that strip, then of course all the rules come to bear.

We need to be sensible, proportional, and consistent in the manner in which UAV activities are regulated, and it needs to have a nuanced view of all the risks involved.

We also have to be mindful—this was alluded to in some ways by the previous speakers—that the technology is moving very quickly in this area. Within five years, I expect that we will have very good sense-and-avoid technologies. We'll have very good fail-safes on these devices and we'll likely have relatively inexpensive transponders that will be able to alert air traffic control and other users of the airspace of the presence of UAV activities, which will enable smarter, intelligent, sense-and-avoid capabilities.

We already have laws related to privacy, trespass, nuisance, and other things like that, so I'm not sure we necessarily need to be coming up with new laws related to any particular technology. Those laws of general application work.

If you regulate from the point of view of technopanic, we would be doing Canada a disservice and baking in regressive rules that will be hard to fix in the future.

I do believe that we should follow the four points that were advocated that relate directly to what the FAA is doing in the United States with a very sensible, straightforward approach. If you're out of the ambit of the 55-pound rule or if you want to go above 400 feet, then you'd be subject to a much more stringent regulatory structure because, obviously, that introduces a different degree of risk.

I very much look forward to this discussion and speaking with you further about this.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Fraser.

You have the floor for six minutes, Mr. Berthold.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much to the witnesses for being here today.

My first question is for Mr. Gervais.

Mr. Fraser has just explained the U.S. drone regulations, which are very simple. Have you had an opportunity to review them? Until the drones are technologically more advanced, could those regulations make it possible to act quickly on the issue?

[Bernard Gervais]

I don’t know enough about the U.S. regulations to give you an answer. All I know is that there are changes to the Canadian regulations that we are trying to put in place. There are some small differences: we are talking about 300 feet instead of 400 feet and kilos rather than pounds. Aside from that, I have not done a study.

The Americans have caught up quickly in the last few months. They did not know where they were going with the regulations. Are they final for them? I don’t know that either. Instead, I’m looking at how the Transport Canada issue has evolved.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Okay.

Mr. Adamus, have you had a chance to review the U.S. regulations? Mr. Fraser said that they were simple and are at least allowing us to wait until the drones are technologically better equipped, as mentioned earlier.

[Capt Dan Adamus]

I am somewhat familiar with what's going on in the U.S. We have members on a working group with the FAA right now.

The regulations are still under development. There are a lot of ideas being thrown around. Certainly the line of sight is one to look at, as well as collision avoidance systems.

It's the drones in the national airspace system that are most concerning to us, because that's the airspace we would share with these drones and that's the area on which we are concentrating our efforts most.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

That’s great.

I really like the term “technopanic” that Mr. Fraser used. In recent years, whenever a new technology or application has reached as many people as possible, we have actually witnessed a technopanic.

In the case of drones, I believe there is legitimate concern when it comes to the safety of airline passengers or small aircraft users. We are in fact seeing more and more drones.

Mr. Gervais, I was a little surprised that you’re asking Best Buy stores not to sell drones to people who don’t have a certificate or a licence.

We are just starting our study on drones, and I expect we will be learning a lot about this in the coming weeks.

The last time I walked into a Best Buy store, I saw drones the size of my coffee mug, but also bigger ones. Mr. Fraser uses drones to do photography at 200 or 300 feet altitude.

Of the drones being used right now, which are the most threatening for the airline industry?

The question is first for Mr. Gervais and then for Mr. Adamus.

[Bernard Gervais]

Right now, Transport Canada grants exemptions for drones weighing less than 250 grams. Clearly, we are talking about energy that can strike an aircraft. A drone weighing less than 250 grams can cause damage, but drones weighing more than 250 grams are the most dangerous.

The Canadian Owners and Pilots Association suggested that an operator competency card be required, much like the pleasure craft operator card. I have a boat and I had to get my card and register my boat before I was allowed to use it. We are proposing a similar system: to buy a drone, people will need to have taken a course and obtained their competency card. The course, which would be a few hours long, could even be offered online. That could work.

We need to educate people about the use of drones. You can’t just go out in your backyard with your drone when you are, say, in the approach path of Rockcliffe Airport. Even a drone of only 500 grams can be dangerous. When you hit an object of 500 grams at 150 kilometres an hour, there will be damage.

We are stressing the importance of educating people so that they know that even a small drone weighing less than 250 grams can be dangerous. People should be familiar with the rules and regulations. Right now, there is no evidence that people are aware of that. We should just take this a step further by requiring drone users to have the necessary skills, as in the case of pleasure craft.

[Luc Berthold, Conservative, Mégantic—L'Érable, QC]

Mr. Adamus, are you of the same opinion?

[Capt Dan Adamus]

Your question was about which is more dangerous, the large or the small.

A loonie being ingested into an engine can cause severe damage.There is drone technology involving clusters. They're really small and they fly in formation. Even the smallest drones can cause some damage.

To me, they're all the same risk. They have to be flown with the proper education, with the knowledge of the risk they could potentially pose if they're doing something they're not supposed to. They especially have to stay out of the national airspace.

We encourage flying for recreational purposes. I agree with that, but you cannot fly over built-up areas or over crowds or over sporting events. Those are all guidelines currently on the Transport Canada website saying you should not do that. We have to look at all of this.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Sikand, you have six minutes.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Mr. Fraser, I read a report that stated Facebook is trying to bring wireless technology to remote areas via drones.

Let's say this becomes a possibility. You have aerial infrastructure and increased Internet capabilities. How do we protect Canadian interests in firewalls, metadata, and the like?

[David Fraser]

I think that's an interesting perspective and an interesting question. I think it probably is completely outside the ambit of transportation regulation and moves into broadcast and telecommunications regulation.

As far as I know, we currently don't have prohibitions in place that would deal with that, but we certainly do have foreign ownership rules that relate to certain portions of our telecommunications sector. I think that would be where the question would be properly addressed.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you.

Let us assume that in 10 years there's a prolific use of UASs, and not unlike resources or commodities, there's only a finite, limited amount of airspace. Also, let us assume that recreational users, not commercial, don't follow the guidelines, so our legislation is highly ineffective. How do we address the situation? Do we limit the technology available to the public, or do we just increase the penalties?

Perhaps you could speak to that, starting with you, Mr. Adamus.

[Capt Dan Adamus]

I think events have already overtaken us with the technology that's out there. I don't think it's going to go backwards. You're going to have a tough time to limit the capabilities of these—

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

I don't mean the capabilities, but the accessibility to recreational use. Do we not allow the general public to fully access the capabilities that UASs will have?

[Capt Dan Adamus]

If it's done properly, we can do that, but it all starts with education and understanding. A very good place to start is that all UAV users should have to register their UAVs.

As I said in my opening remarks, this will, first of all, give the authorities the ability to track somebody down if their UAV is used in the wrong way. It also sends a message to the user that this is a serious event going on when you're operating one of these UASs, and you have to do so appropriately and get the proper training and understand the regulations.

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you. I agree with you as well.

Mr. Gervais, would you comment?.

[Bernard Gervais]

You were saying that the options would be limited technology or more penalties...?

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

No. I am actually trying to get your take on it.

I'm just operating under the assumption that whatever legislation we put in place is not being followed. If it's not being followed, I don't want an airline to have to crash because somebody didn't follow the rules. How do we as legislators address that situation?