7 “The Technology” discusses the various domains of the evolving UAS and UTM/U-space technology, and includes suggestions for a methodologies for conducting a risk assessment and functional decomposition of complex systems. Chapter 8 “Cybersecurity and Cyber Resilience” offers a historical view of global cybersecurity failures and ties that history to current efforts to identify risks and defensive mechanism to ensure the security of aviation systems.
This is not an engineering text, nor is it a law book, but is a bit of a hybrid of both, focused on the study of one highly technical sector of innovation and economic growth from the proverbial “30,000 ft” view. The reader is cautioned, however, that the technology advances are extremely dynamic, and innovation, or “the next best thing,” is almost a daily occurrence, so that accurately predicting the future is a fool’s errand. As new challenges emerge, entrepreneurs and developers will step up to meet them, occasionally creating a new technology or new subset of existing technology that may not have existed even a year ago. The best we can do is to understand what is happening at this point in time and acquire the tools to respond to the breakneck pace of innovation in unmanned aircraft systems.
Aerospace Series Preface
The field of aerospace is multidisciplinary, covering a large variety of products, disciplines and domains, not merely in design and engineering but in many related supporting activities. The interaction of these diverse components enables the aerospace industry to develop innovative and technologically advanced vehicles and systems. The Aerospace Series aims to be a practical, topical, and relevant series of books aimed at people working in the aerospace industry, including engineering professionals and operators, engineers in academia, and allied professions such as commercial and legal executives. The range of topics is intended to be wide ranging, covering design and development, manufacture, operation and support of aircraft, as well as infrastructure operations and advances in research and technology.
Unmanned air vehicles are a growing and increasingly accepted part of the aerospace environment. Small UAVs equipped with appropriate sensors can carry out leisure, small industry and official roles in the visible and IR spectrum. As their use expands, unmanned air systems will inevitably become involved with, and potentially conflict with, manned vehicles – as has already been demonstrated by numerous encounters near airports. There will need to be new regulations to allow the co-existence of UAVs with GAS, rotary wing, regional and transnational operations. These new regulations could require changes to on-board navigation and proximity warning systems as well as to ATM practices and standards.
This book – UAS Integration into Civil Aerospace – explores the integration of unmanned aircraft into controlled and uncontrolled airspace. It provides a comprehensive overview of regulatory and policy efforts required to move towards full airspace integration, as well as the technology that must be developed and approved for full operation of UAV systems. It also addresses the critical questions of cybersecurity and cyber resilience as they relate to UAV airspace integration. The global ATM system depends heavily on electronic communications and interconnectivity, any interruption of which could lead to potentially catastrophic consequences.
With the rapid evolution of UAV technology, aviation regulators at international, national, and local levels have struggled to keep pace with appropriate rules and standards to ensure that UAV systems operate in shared airspace in a safe, equitable, and efficient manner. This book outlines a path forward that minimizes the safety risks while maximizing potential economic benefits for all users of the airspace. In line with the mission of the Aerospace Series, it combines elements of engineering and emerging technology with an accessible discussion of the important related legal and regulatory issues.
Peter Belobaba, Jonathan Cooper, and Allan Seabridge
Acknowledgements
I gratefully acknowledge the contributions of the following people: Michael Baum for listening to me and in some respects collaborating with me on a previous book; Peter La Franchi for providing valuable information from his perch in Australia; and of course, Sandi for her encouragement and support through the evolution of this book.
1 Background
Introduction
Every civilized nation has some form of rules, regulations, policies, and laws that regulate economic activities and social behaviour. The scope and process for the creation of these guidelines varies widely among nations, depending upon many factors that derive from the form of government and cultures that produce those rules. As a society grows more open and more complex, more rules and regulations may become necessary to maintain order and protect people from harm that may result from the unrestricted activities of others. Those harms can be physical, health related, economic, environmental, or any number of potentially damaging outcomes from a governmental entity, an organization, or an individual doing or failing to do something that threatens the well-being of others. As the technology of unmanned aircraft systems has evolved and more potential users seek to deploy them for recreational, commercial, scientific, or public safety purposes, national and local governments have attempted to address the challenges presented by the integration of remotely piloted aircraft into national civil airspaces, particularly the perception of increased risk of harm to persons or property, by developing regulations that address the risk management and policy issues resulting from the use of these devices.
Since there is no settled overarching international law, treaty, or body of community-based standards that governs unmanned aerial systems (although several such efforts are underway), the developer, manufacturer, distributor, and end user must be wary of the potential for inadvertent violations of existing law, or of having a formerly permitted activity become illegal or proscribed as a result of a change in the rules. Methodologies for understanding the existing rules and participating in the process of developing new or modified rules should be key elements in the business plan for any individual or entity seeking to participate in the unmanned systems arena. Likewise, government regulators can benefit from comprehensive and adaptable criteria for the development of new technologies and the safe integration of those technologies into complex airspace systems.
Setting the Stage for Integration of Remotely Piloted Aircraft into Non-segregated Airspace
Like the oceans, the world’s airspace is a public resource, owned by no one. Territorial waters adjacent to continents, islands, and land masses are controlled by the nations that claim sovereignty over the land contiguous to the oceans. International treaties such as the United Nations Conference on the Law of the Seas (UNCLOS) and United Nations Convention on the Law of the Seas (LCOS) establish the criteria for recognition and structure of national territorial waters, setting limits on the extent of those waters and economic zones. There are dozens of such treaties, conventions and instruments dealing with every conceivable aspect of human management of the world’s oceans. Disputes often arise about the interpretation of treaty language and there is a forum to resolve those disputes. “Peaceful settlement of international disputes occupies an important place in international law in general and the law of the sea is no exception” (Tanaka 2012). The same can be said for the treaties and conventions that deal with international airspace, specifically the Convention on International Civil Aviation (also known as the Chicago Convention of 1944), which created the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The similarity between the legal regimes of international and domestic airspace and the high seas (and coastal waters) bears examination, for many aviation regulations are derived from ancient maritime common law.
The Law of the Sea and the Law of the Air
Perhaps the greatest challenge to lawmakers and regulators charged with maintaining an
