How To: Make Notifications for Drone Flights in Belgium using IDRONECT
Note: Find more IDRONECT How To articles here
In Belgium, according to its drone regulations, you need to notify your flights to the authorities in certain circumstances. First of all by authorities we mean the Belgian Civil Aviation Authorities (BCAA in English, DGLV in Dutch and DGTA in French).
Second, not all flights need to be notified in Belgium. For example, recreational flights and so-called low risk flights (class 2 flights) do not need notification. Only those flights that are classified having a higher risk-level need to be notified. They are called the Class 1 flights. Two subclasses exist within this category, namely the Class 1B and Class 1A flights.
There are a few parameters that determine whether an intended flights is considered a 1A or 1B flight. It is based on the weight of the drone, the height of the flight and the environment and place of flying. IDRONECT calculates which flight class is applicable to your flight based on the parameters in your user profile and interpretation of the intended flight scenario. IDRONECT removes the guesswork and sets you up for the required formalities, and make it easy to be compliant with those formalities.
So let’s see how that works.
The starting point is creating your profiles in IDRONECT, which is easy and straightforward.
Then it’s time to plan a flight, or as we call it, create a flight scenario, by selecting the place to fly, the drone, pilot and answer a few risk oriented questions.
Then you end up here:
IDRONECT calculates which flight class is applicable to you. It can be Class 3, Class 2, Class 1A and Class 1B. (In the example picture above, see it is class 1A, due to height and weight of drone)
When the flight class is determined, IDRONECT shifts in the next gear by setting up the required formalities for that particular class.
Basically, when talking about class 1 flights we see:
Class 1B flights: need for declaration and notification as well as requirements on pilots and drones.
Class 1A flights: need for authorisation and notification as well as requirements on pilots and drones.
IDRONECT’s intelligence will alert the user if one of the conditions for a flight scenario is not met. For example, trying to create a flight scenario in class 1A and selecting a pilot who does not have the right qualifications is not possible.
For more information on how to make declarations and request authorisations we refer to this article.
In the mission control page of IDRONECT for a certain flight scenario, we will find the required steps on the right side of the screen, as well as the status of those steps.
Steps for a class 1B flight
Steps for a class 1A flight
On the top left corner you will see the flight scenario title you gave and a quick heads-up on the applicable flight class and planned height.
To the right of the planned flight map, two red boxes appear. One for ‘Authorisation Required’ and one for ‘Notification Required’.
These boxes are red because the steps are not yet completed.
So how do we get these steps done ?
First we will make sure that we can perform this flight under an existing authorisation. We can find our available authorisations in the Profile section — Authorisations.
In the picture above you can see that the user has an authorisation called ‘The Demo Drone Company 1A authorisation’ with a number OPS-1234567. When you click on ‘VIEW’ you can see the details of this authorisation.
We can also just click on ‘Check Authorisation’ in the red box.
The following screen opens up.
We see the available authorisations , can view the details or simply select the one we want to use.
If we are satisfied that this particular authorisation is suited to plan the intended flight, we can select this authorisation in our mission page.
When clicking on the correct line select button, IDRONECT asks us to confirm.
Click Yes if you are satisfied.
Then the following screen appears:
We see now that the Authorisation box has turned green and the only red box is the Notification box. We will now create the notification for this flight by clicking ‘Create Notification’.
The following screen opens:
On the right side we see the address details (comes from the start location you gave in the scenario creation). Pick the desired start date and end date, select start time and end time (in GMT) and click in the field Activity Types.
Select as many as needed for the intended flight (you will only see the authorised activities listed in your authorisation).
Once this is done, you can see the result in the document to the right. Scroll down and verify everything is correct. If everything is correct, click Download as pdf, Save or Save and Send to Authority.
And scrolling a bit down ,
When the notification is sent straight to the BCAA (DGLV/DGTA) the following message appears
We also see now that the Notification box has turned green as well.
In our mailbox we get a copy of the mail sent to the BCAA.
If you open the email we see the text sent to the BCAA and attached is the notification in pdf format.
We will now be able to follow the voyage of the email sent to the BCAA in IDRONECT by clicking on Notifications list in the Notifications box. This screens opens and shows the status of the notification mail.
When we receive the ticket number email from the BCAA, it counts as the acknowledgement. The details of this mail are also shown in IDRONECT as seen below.
Making Notifications in IDRONECT is easy and fast, and is a feature of the Premium version.
