Bhutan Civil Aviation Authority (BCAA) has granted permission to use Unmanned Aerial Vehicles or Drones, within the airspace of the country, provided operators comply with BCAA’s conditions.
BCAA restricted the use of Drones in 2015.
“There were numerous requests from various agencies to use drones for a larger purpose such as survey of terrain otherwise not accessible, taking photographs important to our country. So, we had to make some exceptions,” said BCAA’s Director, Wangdi Gyaltshen.
Operators will need security clearance from Police, Army, Home Ministry, BICMA and Air Traffic Control-Paro.
They should also technical specifications of drones and pilot experience to BCAA.
BCAA’s condition says a pilot should not operate a drone above 90 metres from the ground or water and fly with direct Visual Line of Sight.
They will not be permitted to fly in congested areas and within five kilometres of airports.
Operator should be responsible for safe operation and compensate for any loss due to technical failure, according to the conditions.
“Our concern is the difficulty in monitoring unauthorised drones because we get calls from different places saying people are flying drones. It is hard for us to monitor.”
Wangdi Gyeltshen said as an interim measure, they are working with the dzongkhags’ police.
“In other countries, I believe any drone of small category, don’t require any approval to fly. But, we cannot adopt whatever they do. For Bhutan, any drone, irrespective of size, will need permission.”
BCAA will also inform the tourists about the conditions to use a drone through the Tourism Council of Bhutan.
