The last I heard there are millions of kids in arcades who can fly space ships. It shouldnt be too hard to recruit them and train them as student pilots for drones.
There is no minimum aeronautical knowledge or experience requirement for the issuance of a student pilot certificate other than the medical requirements for the class of medical certificate (see below) the student certificate is based upon. There are, however, minimum aeronautical knowledge and experience requirements for student pilots to solo, including:[7]
Hold at least a current third class medical certificate (except for glider, balloon or sport pilot).
Be at least 16 years of age (14 for glider or balloon)
Read, speak, write, and understand the English language.
Demonstrate satisfactory aeronautical knowledge on a knowledge test, including knowledge of the following areas:
Airspace rules and procedures for the airport where the solo flight will be performed
Flight characteristics and operational limitations for the make and model of aircraft to be flown
Receive and log flight training for the maneuvers and procedures appropriate to the make and model of aircraft to be flown, including:
Preflight operations
Taxiing or surface operations, including run-ups
Takeoffs and landings, including normal and cross-wind
Straight and level flight, and turns in both directions
Climbs and climbing turns
Airport traffic patterns, including entry and departure procedures
Collision avoidance, wind shear avoidance, and wake turbulence avoidance
Descents, with and without turns, using high and low drag configurations
Flight at various airspeeds from cruise to slow flight
Stall entries from various flight attitudes and power combinations with recovery initiated at the first indication of a stall, and recovery from a full stall
Emergency procedures and equipment malfunctions
Ground reference maneuvers
Approaches to a landing area with simulated engine malfunctions
Slips to a landing
Go-arounds
The UAV program is interesting because the camera points down and is controlled by a joystick. Gamers could fly the plane but the controls use actual airplane data so a pilot’s knowledge is required. The UAV also has unusual characteristics like the control surfaces meaning different angles at different inclinations – since the aircraft structure also flexes – so it takes training at this particular job to do it right. (Early users of the system had unacceptable losses due to operator error and these babies are expensive.)
The main problem however is that in this airspace the pilots depend on their vision to avoid collisions. (See and be seen) These UAVs do not support this. When we flew on a Navy bombing range in south Texas, the Navy pilots stayed off the entire range because of their fear of flying into one of these low profile aircraft and ruining their whole day. (In a collision with a small private aircraft, who would be at fault?)
There was another program to use balloons to hoist cameras above the border, where did this go? And what is so wrong with a fence and some patrols? I know that the IR camera does a great job of tracking persons in the desert at night but seriously, these predators are overkill. BTW, Lockheed build a UAV that did not need pilot experience, but it was deemed too expensive and too easy to convert into a weapon (cruise missile) to be used.