Take action NOW to raise the 250-gram drone weight limit

What if there was one thing you could change about drone regulations in the United States that would make life better for a huge number of hobbyists? (spoiler: raise the drone weight limit!)

Today, I’m going to tell you what that one thing could be, and I’m going to ask you to take five minutes of your time to do something to try to help make it happen. I want you to keep watching this video, even if you’re a person who says, “’crew drone regulations! I don’t care about any of that. I’m going to fly how I want to fly. It doesn’t affect me.” I’m going to ask you to watch this video anyway, and I’ll tell you why in just a second.

Raise the 250-gram drone weight limit

The one thing that we are going to try to achieve today that will make life better for the largest number of people while still being within the realm of possibility is to raise the 250-gram drone weight limit up to one kilogram.

In the United States, aircraft, sUAS, drones, whatever you want to call them, that weigh under 250 grams are exempt from a lot of rules, such as registration and Remote ID. The FPV Freedom Coalition and the Flite Test Community Association have decided that we should put our energy into getting that drone weight limit raised from 250 grams to one kilogram.

Raising that limit to one kilogram would mean a whole lot more aircraft would be exempt from some of these rules, and some people have asked: If not one kilogram, why not two kilograms? Why not five kilograms?

Click this link to go to the FPV Freedom Coalition website and reach out to Congress!

The folks over at the FPV Freedom Coalition feel that one kilogram is the sweet spot, where a lot of hobbyists will fall under that umbrella without crossing over into weight classes, where the aircraft might be truly dangerous in a way that a lighter aircraft wouldn’t. They believe that one kilogram is the sweet spot.

We have asked the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for many things, and in some cases, we’ve received small concessions here and there. But for the most part, most people watching this feel that we haven’t really been given what we asked for by the FAA.

So, why is this going to be any different?

This is different. Because every five years, Congress has to pass the FAA reauthorization act. Basically, that is the statutory authority that gives the FAA the right to exist, regulate, and do what it does. Every time Congress passes the FAA reauthorization act, they tell the FAA, “Here are some things that we want you to do,” and the FAA has to do those things.

That’s why Remote ID exists. Congress told the FAA, You must regulate drones, you must make remote ID a thing. We’re hoping that in 2023, it’s up for reauthorization again, and this time we can kind of do an end run around the FAA by going directly to our representatives.

The FPV Freedom Coalition and Flite Test Community Association have created a form letter, so you don’t even have to write the letter yourself. They have created a form letter, and they are asking you.

I’m asking you to send these letters to your representatives. I’m going to link you to a web page that shows you exactly how to do it. You don’t have to mail a physical letter; you can literally do it through a web form or an email address. It will take you five or ten minutes.

Click this link to go to the FPV Freedom Coalition website and reach out to Congress!

Please do this and get everyone you can think of to do this. Signal boost this as wide and far as you can because our elected representatives listen to their constituents in a way that a big government regulatory agency like the FAA simply doesn’t.

How to raise the drone weight limit?

The FAA doesn’t work for us, they work for Congress, at least in theory. Congress works for us. And if the folks over at the FPG Freedom Coalition and the Flite Test Community Association say that they think this is a worthy effort and have put the word out, please do this. That’s good enough for me, and I hope it’s good enough for you.

This is the part of the video where I talk to the people who have kind of checked out on this and just say, “Nope, I’m not going to comply. I’m going to do my thing. They can’t catch me anyway.”

Whatever your thought process is, I want to ask you to send a letter anyway.

Number one, not everybody has the option to do so. People who are trying to set up STEM programs in schools, Scout Troops, or anyone working in an actual official organization have to obey the rules. They just don’t have the option to ignore them, even if others do.

Click this link to go to the FPV Freedom Coalition website and reach out to Congress!

Some of us, some of you, will get in trouble if we ignore the rules. The more people who follow the rules, the fewer there will be for the FAA to levy fines on. So changing this limit is good for everybody.

Here’s one idea: How sweet would it be for Congress to go to the FAA and say, “’Hey, hobbyists talk to us, and we’re telling you that you have to raise this limit?”

How freaking sweet would it be for us to be able to do an end run around the FAA, go to their boss, and have their boss tell them to change this rule? Wouldn’t that be amazing?

Whatever it takes, I hope that you will go and send this letter. It’s good for all RC hobbyists in the United States, whether it’s fixed-wing drones or not.

Raising the one-kilogram limit means that more of us can keep doing the things that we’ve always done without having to think too much about these onerous regulations.

If you want to know more about this topic, I have an interview that I did with the folks at the FPV Freedom Coalition and the Flite Test Community Association.

We sat down, and I asked them some hard questions about their thoughts behind this. What do you think our chances of success actually are? I’ll put a link to that in the video description, as well as a card on the screen.

In addition to that, the Flite Test Community Association has a video they’ve put out outlining their thoughts, and I’ll put a card on the screen and a link to that down below, as well as a link to the freaking page where you can go and send the form letter. See you there!