New Rules in Place for Recreational Drone Users

Transport Canada has some new rules put in place for recreational drone users, whose drones weigh more than 250 grams and up to 35 kilograms.

Included in the list of new rules, drones can’t be flown higher than 90 meters above the ground, closer than 75 meters from buildings, vehicles, vessels, animals and people and closer than 9 kilometers from the centre of an aerodrome.

Director General for Civil Aviation at Transport Canada, Aaron McCrorie, said a lot of people just aren’t aware of some of the dangers of drone usage.

“We think most people want to operate safely, but there are some people who don’t understand the rules or don’t know the rules. So, we decided to take some action to ensure they stay away from higher risk areas.”

McCrorie said he’s not blaming people for their mistakes when it comes to flying drones, but believes people need to be more aware of what they can and can’t do.

“I don’t think it’s malicious, but just don’t know yet how to operate properly and operate safely. We really want to target them to limit where they fly, at least until we bring in more rules that can create a more permissive regime that would allow them to fly in certain conditions in higher risk areas.”

A full list of rules:

Higher than 90 m above the ground
Closer than 75 m from buildings, vehicles, vessels, animals, people/crowds
Closer than 9 km from the centre of an aerodrome (any airport, heliport, seaplane base or anywhere that aircraft take-off and land)
Within controlled or restricted airspace
Within 9 km of a forest fire
Where you could interfere with police or first responders
At night or in clouds
If you can’t keep it in sight at all times
If you are not within 500m of your drone
If your name, address and telephone number are not clearly marked on your drone.