In Ireland, new laws and regulations may directly affect the number of people who use drones. The new law states that drone owners need to register their devices before being able to take flight. These drones weighing above 250 grams require paperwork before you can even take it out for a spin.
This is an escalating case, as the previous regulation mandated drones over 1 kilogram to register. Before, anything less than 1 kilogram can fly into the skies without any tight restrictions. Of course, what can a 500-gram drone do on its own? Smaller drones tend to fly less, as they have fewer battery life and reach. Now, things may truly change for those interested in (or want to) fly drones.
Ireland Drone Registration
This increases accountability to owners, some of whom have littered the skies in inconvenient places. Places, for example, like airports and private residences. Drones flying over suburban areas increase the ongoing fears of privacy breaches, as well as the rising number of Peeping Toms caught. This leaves the question: how safe is leaving a door or window open, knowing a drone somewhere may pass by and record it?
However, the truly dangerous aspect of a drone comes in aircrafts and airports, as seen in the recent Gatwick incident. Drones are capable of shutting down entire airports in the event they fly too close to one. This increases the risk of planes colliding into it, and may even crash in the process. The lives of the passengers, the crew, and even the people below the flight path of the plane are put into dangerous territory.
In these incidents, the owners of the drone rarely get caught. By the time police and other authority figures arrive on the scene of the incident, the owner as well as the drone has long been gone. It can be difficult to check who the owner of the drone is after the brief sighting in the field. Registrations may solve this dilemma, as each drone can now have their own identification which can be traced back to their owners.
