Posted on 10/21/2025 11:00:32 AM PDT by Red Badger
The FAA already has a pilots licence category for them. Powered lift aka VTOL vs a helicopter certification on your PPL. The FAA is never going to let unlicensed people fly into Class G let alone E,D,C,B,or A regulated airspace. Only case G is uncontrolled NOT unlicensed. It’s far away from airports 1200AGL with 1 no day / 3 mile night time minimums.
https://mitchellflight.com/2018/10/vfr-wx-minimums-made-easy/
VFR gets to play in class E buy IFR needs ATC and a flight plan.
https://www.boldmethod.com/learn-to-fly/airspace/class-e-airspace/
In short no ,joe six pack is not flying into the national airspace without a PPL and a powered lift cert at the very least you would want your IMC cert or you are very limited on when and where you can fly.
Anyone hyperventilating about aircraft like these firstly is not a pilot and secondly doesn’t understand how the national airspace system works. Congress would have to pass legislation removing the onboard pilot requirements and allow for remote pilots like large drones in the NAS ,Congress is never going to write a law where you can fly unlicensed EVER.
Oh, yeah. I am a pilot - general aviation - and I’m looking at that and I’m thinking holy crap, could I do that? Or would I kill myself trying? And would I care if I did? Could I still pass a flight physical? You dang kids are so lucky. LOL!
Ah yes the dreaded CFR 14 Part 1...The don’t eat salty food is drink beer the day before exam else hypertension fails you. Heavy dose of Beta blockers two hours beforehand ;) type 3 certs are good for 2 years over 40 so be good once every two years.
I can see a future where in FAA NEXGEN automated drones for delivery and airtaxi of humans are allowed to fly prefiled digital flight plans, where there is full Mode S 1090ES+ ADS-B in&out onboard TCAS too. With licenced pilots on staff remotely ready to do full remote pilot control via 5G or low latency sat comm links like Starlink,Kuiper,GuoWang and Qianfan,or Russia’s up coming Rassvet (”Dawn”). All of thousands going to out 20-100 millisecond latency 4/8K video and command control in 6-12” sized phased array antennas add in a 5G NR modem and you have real time 360 degrees video and telepresence for a remote human pilot. This is the only way I see the FAA under FAR regs allowing flights in G or E NAS space you won’t ever see it in a Mode C surface area, B or A where commercial aircraft fly do terminal ops. You wouldn’t want to overload 1090ES so ADS-B out via UAT only and Mode S only on interrogation this automatically would exclude class A airspace for drones and UberAir types.
Would be good side income for Pilots get a powered lift cert and sit standby while making $$$ per hour with a commercial grade flight sim set up for telepresence if a drone gets in trouble. I see the same thing using the same data channels for autonomous driving trucks and autonomous driving cars like waymo and the Tesla cyber Taxi humans ready via 5G to take over in the event they get lost or stuck.
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