In Australia, if you want to fly your drone for recreation, you can do so without a formal qualification or approval from CASA (Civil Aviation Safety Authority), providing you follow CASA’s safety rules for recreational pilots.
A summary of the rules can be found here:
- You may only fly a drone within visual line of sight.
- You can only fly during daylight, ensuring you do not fly through fog or cloud.
- You must be at least 30 metres away from vehicles, boats, buildings or people.
- You should not fly within 30m of people.
- You may not fly higher than 120 metres above the ground.
- You should keep at least 5.5km away from airfields, aerodromes and helicopter landing sites (which covers most Australian cities).
- Never fly near any emergency situations where you may be presenting a risk to the emergency operations taking place.
Flight Foundations
For recreational drone users we recommend undertaking our Flight Foundations course. When learning to fly a drone there is a lot of information to take in. Our concise two day course covers the essentials of flying drones. You will cover a range of topics including:
- The essentials of flying drones
- Operating RPA’s safely
- Dangers when flying
- Australian drone rules and regulations
- Several practical flight lessons.
Training is conducted on our fleet of drones, meaning you can practise on our drones before purchasing your own.
Want to earn money from flying your drone?
If you want to earn money from flying your drone there are different rules depending on the size of your remote pilot aircraft. If you have questions about commercial drone operations, get in touch with one of our drone experts.
Please note, this is a summary only. More information can be found on CASA’s website: www.casa.gov.au