Welcome to your weekly UAS news update. We have four stories for you this week. The DJI Neo 3 has a video leak. We have a Sky Elements Guinness World Record. The FAA hands out $12 million to drone test sites, and then the FBI doubles its counter-drone school capacity. So, let’s get to it.

The DJI Neo 3 Comes Out of the Box in a 49-Second Leak

First up, a 49-second unboxing video of the DJI Neo 3 Fly More Combo has leaked. This one comes from DroneXL’s Jasper Ellens, who posted it on Tuesday, and he says that it first appeared on TikTok. Now, this time the drone actually comes out of the box.

We talked about this before a little bit, and as you can see, it has a spoked prop cage on all four propellers. Then there’s the RC Mini controller with the screen, which looks almost like a Game Boy, a charging hub, and three different batteries. The drone itself appears to have a small screen on the nose, but it’s unclear at the moment what it’s actually going to be for. A production listing puts the weight at 192.7 grams, which is very lightweight.

The RC Mini has FCC approval, but we talked about this before, the Neo 3 does not have approval, so the aircraft itself will not be able to be sold or purchased in the United States.

Sky Elements Flies 71,207 Drones for Two Guinness World Records

Next up, Sky Elements has set two Guinness World Records in Blue Ridge, Texas. Working with Damoda America, they were able to fly 71,207 drones during shows between September 27 and September 29. Now, the old record was 55,939 drones.

Six of the shows used more than 10,000 drones each, with a finale of 11,000 drones.

The company says that this is the largest drone show ever flown in the United States. Crews had to recharge and reset and relaunch the entire fleet between the shows, which I’m sure was a ton of work. We’ve seen these drone shows before, and it’s quite an amazing production.

The CEO says that shows this big have mostly happened only in Asia and the Middle East. Sky Elements now wants to sell these large drone shows to sports leagues and cities and brands.

And yes, before you ask, this is absolutely legal. Every time we talk about drone shows, people ask about the legality of doing this. You have to get waivers in order to fly more than one drone, but it is absolutely possible.

The FAA Hands $12 Million to 19 Projects at Its Nine Test Sites

Now, to the FAA. On Monday it announced $12 million for 19 drone research projects. Each project is paired with one of the nine FAA UAS test sites approved in the US. The projects are going to cover detect and avoid, command and control, traffic management, and drone identification.

And as always with these grants, the FAA really wants to have real-world data that it can use in future rulemaking.

This is not new money. We actually talked about these grants a while back. Congress ordered $6 million a year in the 2024 FAA Reauthorization Act, and companies that are awarded this money must match the funding at least one to one.

The word is that the data should inform Part 108, the BVLOS rule that has sat at OIRA since July 10. Now, that was 87 days as of Monday. Unfortunately, I don’t think they’re going to get the data before they go public, but an FAA official, Robert Reckert, said last month that it’s at the 10-yard line, whatever that means, and they hope that it gets published later this year. We’re going to have to wait and see, and we’ll keep you posted.

The FBI Doubles Its Counter-Drone School After 700 World Cup Takedowns

And finally, the FBI is doubling its counter-drone school. Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward toured the National Counter-UAS Training Center in Huntsville, Alabama, on October 1, and he stated that the capacity will be more than doubled in year two.

Woodward said that every host city for the World Cup attended, and over 700 drones were taken down. He also noted that none of the aircraft that were mitigated carried ordnance, which is a good thing.

If you’re not familiar, since July 1 it’s the only place a state or local officer can earn authority in order to take down a drone under the Safer Skies Act that was recently passed. Now, when the rule was published, only 61 officers nationwide held that certificate, and the first class last October had just 12 people in it.

Woodward didn’t say the current capacity, so the doubling really has no public baseline, but the FBI plans on graduating 250 more officers next fiscal year.

Now, according to that information and other publicly available information, those 700 drones were not a threat. They were just pilots who flew into the restricted airspace without having approval. And it’s always a good reminder to be sure to check TFRs every single time you fly.

That conversation is going to continue on Post Flight, where we’re going to talk about all of this uncensored in the premium community. There’s a link in the description. We’ll see you for the live Q&A on Monday. Have a great weekend. See you then.

This article is based on a video from our YouTube partner Greg Reverdiau. Watch the full weekly UAS news update on the Pilot Institute YouTube channel, and find more of Greg’s work on his DroneXL author page.