Drone executive orders ‘an important step to increase homeland security,’ expert says

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A pair of executive orders issued by the White House on June 6 purport to “Restore American airspace sovereignty” and “Unleash American drone dominance.” 

The orders direct the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to, among other things, “expand drone operations by enabling routine ‘Beyond Visual Line of Sight’ drone operations for commercial and public safety missions, and to accelerate the development, testing, and scaling of American drone technologies, including advanced air mobility and autonomous operations,” as well as establish a task force to review and propose solutions to unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) threats. 

It also directs the commerce secretary to promote the export of U.S.-made drones and prioritize their purchase for federal agencies, actions thought to be a long time coming for many in the industry.  

“Although Congress mandated the Federal Aviation Administration to develop a process to restrict airspace over critical infrastructure almost a decade ago through Section 2209, there has been limited success on this front since then,” said Tom Adams, director of public safety at DroneShield. “While these flight restrictions won’t prevent unauthorized drone incursions over designated critical infrastructure, it is an important step to increase homeland security and enable enhanced enforcement capabilities that weren’t available previously.”   

Addressing the establishment of a task force for Counter-UAS operations, Adams urged stakeholders to take queues from the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI’s) Hazardous Devices School for public safety bomb technicians as a model for standardized training and readiness. 

“A National Training Center rooted in the FBI’s approach for public safety bomb technicians will surely help us put our best foot forward in ensuring that federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies designated to have these advanced C-UAS capabilities are consistently trained, while minimizing the risk to the public and critical infrastructure they are trying to protect,” said Adams, a former FBI agent and bomb technician. 

The orders also promote grants for law enforcement agencies, including state, local, and tribal, to pursue access to anti-drone technology like detection and tracking. 

Fact sheets for both orders can be read in full online at https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets.