26 more Green Zone sites for Drones approved

The central government has recently given the approval for 26 more green zone site for drones.

Highlights

• The approval was given in the light of facilitating the operations by No-Permission-No-Take-off (NPNT) compliant drones.
• The approval was given by the Ministry of Home Affairs and Ministry of Defence.
• The ministry has also given its nod for six green zone sites earlier.
• This order was issued by Amber Dubey who is the Joint Secretary of Ministry of civil aviation.
• These approved sites will be enabled on the Digital Sky Platform now.
• After that, all Unique Identification Number holders would be given instant flight permissions online.

What is NPNT?

NPNT is an automated green signal. Without this green signal, drones are not authorised to fly. To handle such automatic flight authorisation, the Digital Sky is currently being developed.

What are those Green Zones?

In the Green Zones for which nod was given,

• Uttar Pradesh has the maximum number of eight
• Six sites were approved in Jharkhand
• Four in Chhattisgarh
• Two in Telangana
• One in each of Andhra Pradesh, Meghalaya, Gujarat; Odisha, Mizoram and Tamil Nadu.

How the permission to fly can be obtained?

RPAS operators or remote pilots will require to file a flight plan in order to get the flying permission. To flying in the ‘green-zones’, intimation of the time and location of the flights will be required through the portal or the app. To fly in the yellow zone, permissions will be required but, no flights will be allowed to fly in  the ‘red zones’

What are Drones?

Drones are also called as the Remotely Piloted Aerial Systems. These are a technology platform having a wide-ranging application. India had announced the release of its Civil Aviation Regulations in order to provide safe flying environment to the RPAS in August 2018.

Significance

Drones can be proved beneficial for farmers and infrastructure entities such as roads, railways, ports, factories and mines. It will also benefit the sectors such as photography, insurance and entertainment.

Month: Current Affairs - February, 2021